I've crossed into Israel at this particular border point, around 5 years ago, and yes it was one of the hardest border crossings I've ever done, we were part of a tourist party who were going to be in Israel for around 30 minutes (a quick drive through Elat then out into Jordan), and its not somewhere I would take anything bigger than a camera I would even if I could empty the card before I went through. Everything was Xrayed, the metal detectors were so sensitive every scrap of metal was detected, a few people having to remove jeans with quite a few studs, your personal property was swabbed and checked for explosives and then once through there you were grilled about your personal details at passport control, quite a few people getting long grillings. All under the watch of guys with automatic weapons. It wasn't a place you made any kind of joke, you do exactly as you are told. At the time I though it was overkill then a week later this happened http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Sinai_bombings, a terrorist attack aimed at the Israelis pretty much at that border point (although on the Egyptian side), kind of puts it all into perspective. Saying that since that border crossing, I am a lot more careful what I take with me, laptops and cameras fully backed up, and only take essentials, even bought a travel laptop so my main machine would stay safe at home. Everything electrical packed into one easy to search bag. Jen

Generally you are right, however the RNLI does actually do the "Baywatch" type life guards as well. http://www.rnli.org.uk/what_we_do/sea_and_beach_safety/rnli_lifeguards

I'm a software developer and will often create my own certificates for testing purposes, and in my test lab people will trust them, however out in the wild there is no excuse for not getting a proper certificate signed by a proper authority.

Not only is this coming across as the company trying to do things on the cheap it has the possiblity of unraveling the trust of SSL for places you actually care about. If this becomes wide spread just think of the phishers create a copy of A Bank's site make their own SSL and put a note on the login screen "Dont worry you have to do some work to trust this certificate everything is alright honest guv."

Personally I normally trust self signed SSL certificates for sites I visit if they have them as i know the risks, but to potentially undermine for general users is just mad.