It's the latest cretinous-lemming craze in the world of high tech - we _MUST_ hide all our bits in encryption, because otherwise some dastardly, evil government agency will peer at them ... or something like that. Let's all just conveniently ignore the fact that if said government agency/ies _really_ wanted to know what someone was doing online, they'd perhaps infect that machine's bloat-/Swiss-cheese-ware, which passes for contemporary 'best software practices', with a virus that would report every keystroke ... or something like that. Never mind! Everyone turning on mandatory HTTPS on their server, refusing to even deign to talk to you without it, can sleep the oblivious sleep of the morally superior, rigidly secure in the knowledge that they have done their bit in the crucial fight of out time, to protect privacy and human rights. ... Or something like that. Sorry. You pressed one of my hot buttons - one that is connected to several other of my hot buttons. Noel