They haven't. Not really.
Let’s crack open the history. The story begins in December 2009. RockYou was a popular widget developer for social media platforms like MySpace and Facebook (remember "Super Wall"?). They were riding the Web 2.0 wave. rockyou wordlist
Thus, rockyou.txt was born.
Downloading and using this list against systems you do not own is illegal. This blog is for educational defense, not offense. The Verdict RockYou went bankrupt long ago, but their legacy lives on in every brute-force attack and security audit. As long as humans continue to look at a "Create Password" screen and type 123456 , the ghost of RockYou will continue to haunt the web. They haven't