Email security                 rev 20 november 2010
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 Your email is not private.
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 What?!! Yes.
 All your email is going through the wires in plain text. Any hacker
 can easily read it. Even when it is sitting on the server, such as
 in your gmail account, it is constantly being "read" - searched - 
 by gmail programs (or yahoo, or wherever). 
 Also if some bad guy got your email account login, they may be 
 reading your email all the time, with no way for you to know.

 In a recent event, the incoming email of an important Tibetan 
 organisation was being forwarded to China. By the time the account owner
 found out this was happening, they also found that the email in the account 
 had been deleted as well. 

 Never send logins or passwords in email!
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 I would never send passwords in email, or even use the words "password"
 or "login" in email. When i have to use the word, i mess it up with 
 asterisks -- like this:

    Never send p*s*ds in email!

 You can use a telephone call, sms, or skype chat to send critical info.
 It may not be completely safe, but it is safer than sending in email.

 Nah, it can't be that bad!
 --------------------------
 I may be over-paranoid. On the other hand, i get contacted to help restore 
 a hacked website at least once a month, and hear about hacked email accounts 
 almost as often. 

 This is too hard!
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 The internet is the new front in the fight for freedom all over the world.
 How much is that freedom, and Tibet's freedom, worth?

  


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