There’s a Lesson About Yahoo! Security I Learned from Palin Today

2008-09-17T15:08:09-07:00

The lesson is this: Yahoo! doesn’t use encryption on their webmail. I’ll repeat that: YAHOO! DOESN’T USE ENCRYPTION ON THEIR WEBMAIL!

I’m nothing short of shocked. I could have sworn that Yahoo! was a $26B company. Surely, SURELY they, of all people would see the importance and value of secure email, right? Nope.

They’ve been offering free email since at least April of 1996 when they had their IPO. Somehow in the last 12 years they never secured the damned thing? What?

Note below the conspicuous use of http rather than https:

Sarah Palin - Worst candidate of all time?

2008-09-05T08:51:04-07:00

I have been getting a lot of email lately from various organizations telling me about Sarah Palin. They’ve started to pile up in my inbox, so I decided that I better learn a little about the woman. Here’s what I learned so far:

She was mayor of a town so small it didn’t have a police department^[1]
She believes the Iraq war is “a task from God.”^[2]
Referring to a natural gas line she wanted built, she said, “God’s will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that.”^[2] Gods will? What?
She has been Governor of Alaska for about a year and a half. For the ten years or so prior to that, she was mayor of a TINY town of about 5,469 people.^[3]
She opposes abortion in all cases except if the health of the mother is in danger. That includes rape and incest.^[4]
As of 2006, she supported teaching creationism in schools. To wit: “Teach both…I am a proponent of teaching both.”^[5]
She sued the Bush administration for listing polar bears as a threatened species.^[6]

Do we really want this person in any position of power? To reiterate, she was mayor of a town of about 5,000 people for the bulk of her time in politics, she believes she knows the will of God, she would have creationism in schools, she would have rape victims give birth to the rapist’s child against their will, and is even more anti-environmental than the Bush administration.

Incredible. Please help get this word out. This is awful, and not just a passing concern.

References ^1. http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1837918,00.html ^2. http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jNulPSqaP1eyysv8ENJWhk0ZSrPgD92VJPL00 ^3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wasilla,_Alaska ^4. http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/101906/sta_20061019031.shtml ^5. http://dwb.adn.com/news/politics/elections/story/8347904p-8243554c.html ^6. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article3987891.ece

Michael Jay Lissner

There’s a Lesson About Yahoo! Security I Learned from Palin Today

Sarah Palin - Worst candidate of all time?