I frequent many cycling websites and when some cyclists have problems with school or with computers, I try to help them. Today, one cyclist was having a problem with getting some financial aid sorted out with this school. He wanted me to verify that his email was working since he had emailed them many times and had no luck in getting a response (he's 300 miles and has no access to long distance).

As a reply to my test, he forward me the email. I did a search through the headers and discovered the school was Texas Tech University. I go and check the Financial Aid office and what do I see:

Email Questions to: [email protected]
(please include name and ssn)
UH. Excuse me!? Maybe it's me but doesn't this strike you as just plain silly? Wouldn't it have made more sense to setup a secure website to have students and potential students log in (obviously once they start the process with paper forms they should be assigned a user number and user pass to log into the site with) to check or ask questions.

So now people are used to, and think it's ok, to send personal critical information via email. And expect to be asked for it.