Web based email, such as yahoo, and hotmail

who uses it, who has used it in the past?
what did you think of it, did you have any problems?
i used hotmail till very recently, and found out that was the reason why my computer kept picking up viruses, even without me downloading anything.
also when i went to log in, a little box came up saying 'you are about to leave a secure internet connection. it will be possible for others to view information you send'
what i didn't realise till recently was that meant that people were intercepting my messages, tacking viruses on to them, and then they ended up on my hard drive!
luckily the file wasn't too important, and could be disposed of.

Kaniaz will be here in any moment to give a lecture about internet/e-mail security and how they work :|

Anyway, the only webmail I use nowadays is Gmail and it's my secondary e-mail account. For my primary account I use Mozilla Thunderbird as an e-mail program. Anyway, I think Gmail is secure enough.

lol no it doesnt work like that. Kaniaz is afk watching the incredibles ATM. REFERRED TO DOCTOR :P

I use my Army Knowledge Online (AKO) account. Its completely secure so I never have to worry about that. You have to be given an account for a specific reason to get it though, and you have to do work for the US Army. Kaniaz or someone, try to hack into it and let me know how secure it is.
http://www.us.army.mil

I can't see Kaniaz being too happy at that idea.

I have hotmail as my primary email, but I dont care how much spam goes into it really. But I now use gmail a lot more.
Gmail is brilliant, they have even double the space, and its still increasing!!

I use Gmail, which I think is secure. I've never known anyone who has problems with it. Hotmail has had loads, though.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Merckantium
I use my Army Knowledge Online (AKO) account. Its completely secure so I never have to worry about that. You have to be given an account for a specific reason to get it though, and you have to do work for the US Army. Kaniaz or someone, try to hack into it and let me know how secure it is.
http://www.us.army.mil

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I'm defintely not a security expert, but I expect if it's affilated with the army (goverment) people won't even bother to hack it. And as it is part of that, it's probably very secure (like I'm going to try). It's not the smartest thing to do, hacking sites like that, because they will smash you. I doubt they have a "tolerate shit" policy. Just don't fall into the trap of not using common sense though, because you never know what might happen.

I've noticed that several forums will not accept web-based "free" emails. Why is that?

Sometimes robots sign up for huge masses of these emails, so they can sign up on forums with them etc. Basically they're not reliable enough- although it isn't a problem if you have a code verification tool (and one that actually works and isn't obvious to robots which actually are beginning to get past some of them. see the CAPTCHA site). And anyone can sign up for this email in a minute or two and so it's not reliable, it might just be used and disposed of.

It's a bit paranoid really, but that's their choice.