The Book-keepers Forum (BKF)

Post Info TOPIC: HMRC Site not Secure?
Jay


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 262
Date:
HMRC Site not Secure?
Permalink Closed


 

Good Morning all,

This morning we received the usual email listing HMRC "Talking Points" for the next 4 weeks.

One of the topics was of interest so attempted to sign up for the Webinar.

However our browser ( Chrome) would not let us connect giving a message as follows :

 

"Your connection is not private"

 

Microsoft Edge responds with :

 

This site is not secure


This might mean that someones trying to trick you or steal any information that you send to the server. You should close this site immediately.

 Has anyone else had this problem?

 

Thank you

 

Jay

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



__________________


Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 8646
Date:
Permalink Closed

Hi Jay

Not tried it but funnily (probably not really funny!) enough that is what this forum is showing as in my chrome tab!!!



__________________

 Joanne 

Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017 

Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.

You should check out answers with reference to the legal position



Guru

Status: Offline
Posts: 1313
Date:
Permalink Closed

Hi Jay, I just tried and its saying exactly the same as you

__________________

Doug

These are only my opinions of how I see things and therefore should not be taken as advice



Expert

Status: Offline
Posts: 1811
Date:
Permalink Closed

Interesting. I'm assuming you just mean the generic site at www.gov.uk/government/organisations/hm-revenue-customs and not something more specific (e.g. a particular page or set of pages)?

That address looks fine here (using Palemoon). The site's current certificate doesn't expire until the middle of next month, but I notice that "this website does not supply ownership information" - so I wonder if Chrome is picking up on that and complaining.

Just a guess, as well, but is it Chrome 69? That version came out last week, and there has been some controversy about the way it handles the address bar (specifically, it 'hides' www. and m. from the start of URLs) - so I wonder if the security warning is another, unreported change? (Assuming it is just down to the ownership info.)




__________________

Vince M Hudd - Soft Rock Software

(I only came here looking for fellow apiarists...)

Jay


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 262
Date:
Permalink Closed

I tried it with Chrome and Microsoft Edge with the same result.

 

BW

 

Jay



__________________
Jay


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 262
Date:
Permalink Closed

Panic Over.

Just tried again and all is well. Thanks for the feedback.

 

BW 

 

Jay



__________________


Guru

Status: Offline
Posts: 1313
Date:
Permalink Closed

 

I was on my phone (chrome) earlier when it came back not secure, but just tried on the computer and all is fine 



__________________

Doug

These are only my opinions of how I see things and therefore should not be taken as advice



Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 8646
Date:
Permalink Closed

Anyone else have the not secure message on this little ol' forum?

__________________

 Joanne 

Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017 

Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.

You should check out answers with reference to the legal position



Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 8646
Date:
Permalink Closed

VinceH wrote:

Interesting. I'm assuming you just mean the generic site at www.gov.uk/government/organisations/hm-revenue-customs and not something more specific (e.g. a particular page or set of pages)?

That address looks fine here (using Palemoon). The site's current certificate doesn't expire until the middle of next month, but I notice that "this website does not supply ownership information" - so I wonder if Chrome is picking up on that and complaining.

Just a guess, as well, but is it Chrome 69? That version came out last week, and there has been some controversy about the way it handles the address bar (specifically, it 'hides' www. and m. from the start of URLs) - so I wonder if the security warning is another, unreported change? (Assuming it is just down to the ownership info.)



Ah sorry Vince just seen your post!

Do you think this is this a 'dumbing down' job? 

I didnt like the chrome update but only from the aesthetic point of view  - dont like the look fo the new tabs.  Nor the small shortcuts when you open a tab! 

 



__________________

 Joanne 

Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017 

Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.

You should check out answers with reference to the legal position



Guru

Status: Offline
Posts: 1313
Date:
Permalink Closed

Cheshire wrote:

Anyone else have the not secure message on this little ol' forum?


 Afternoon Joanne, I have not had any problems



__________________

Doug

These are only my opinions of how I see things and therefore should not be taken as advice



Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 8646
Date:
Permalink Closed

Artois wrote:
Cheshire wrote:

Anyone else have the not secure message on this little ol' forum?


 Afternoon Joanne, I have not had any problems


Yoh Doug!

Wnder why I am. Oh dear.  no  maybe its trying to tell me something!wink



__________________

 Joanne 

Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017 

Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.

You should check out answers with reference to the legal position



Expert

Status: Offline
Posts: 1811
Date:
Permalink Closed

Joanne - sorry; I didn't spot your comment earlier about this site.

That's slightly different to what I thought may have been the problem reported for HMRC by Jay originally - and TBH I thought Chrome was already doing this.

It's simply because Google have decided that any site that doesn't serve it's pages over HTTPS is insecure, and have decided that they will try to scare the shit out of users by declaring them insecure.

In layman's terms as best I can:

The forum is served over HTTP (no S) - so technically they are right; it's insecure. What the S version of the protocol means is that the connection between your computer and the server is encrypted, so any data that passes back and forth is unreadable except by those two endpoints: Your computer and the server.

For many sites, Google are being over dramatic (but at the same time they are also giving sites lower rankings in their search algorithms if they aren't served over HTTPS) - but where there are things like log-ins and personal data stored, they have a point. The forum has a log-in (and some personal data, depending how much people give), so it *should* really be served over HTTPS.

It doesn't matter to me because of the way I handle log-ins, with unique email addresses and passwords for everything, but I don't know about others.

__________________

Vince M Hudd - Soft Rock Software

(I only came here looking for fellow apiarists...)



Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 8646
Date:
Permalink Closed

Ah yes, Vince I recall the 's' being the encryted bit now, most likely from previous conversations on here. Thats usually the kind of info I have squirreled away in my brain but I think my brain has done a data dump of useful info due to it being overloaded with client ridiculousness. Either that or Im just getting old and the little grey cells and just screaming 'enough already'!

Thanks for the info. Will park it back in the brain again.

__________________

 Joanne 

Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017 

Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.

You should check out answers with reference to the legal position



Guru

Status: Offline
Posts: 1313
Date:
Permalink Closed

 

Strangely as with Joanne this site has started to show that is not secure on my Laptop and Ipad, not sure if I should have but clicked on the site anyway hopefully nothing to sinister will happen!

 

 

Edit for terrible spelling



-- Edited by Artois on Sunday 30th of September 2018 08:26:01 AM

__________________

Doug

These are only my opinions of how I see things and therefore should not be taken as advice



Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 3904
Date:
Permalink Closed

Artois wrote:

 Strangely as with Joanne this site has started to show that is not secure on my Laptop and Ipad, not sure if I should have but clicked on the site anyway hopefully nothing to sinister will happen!


 Doing it on my mates comp but not on mine if I log in remotely, both using Chrome  <perplexed> 

Double check - Ah, I have the insecure tab but no warning on remote comp, so I guess I have clicked on it and accepted warning previouslu



__________________

John 

 

 

 Any advice given is for general guidance and professional advice should be sought applicable to your circumstances.



Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 159
Date:
Permalink Closed

Artois wrote:

 

Strangely as with Joanne this site has started to show that is not secure on my Laptop and Ipad, not sure if I should have but clicked on the site anyway hopefully nothing to sinister will happen!

 

 

Edit for terrible spelling



-- Edited by Artois on Sunday 30th of September 2018 08:26:01 AM


 I'm getting the not secure message on all my devices :(



__________________

Janet

They keep making the system idiot proof but then make bigger and better idiots!



Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 8646
Date:
Permalink Closed

Hi gang
Unfortunately the messages now popping up when you try to login, notably on a PC, are a bit more worrying than before. Last time I referred to this it was just in the tab itself. Now a message, like the one below actually pops up and is doing so on google chrome, Firefox and others.

BKN - Access issue.jpg



-- Edited by Cheshire on Sunday 30th of September 2018 04:36:57 PM

Attachments
__________________

 Joanne 

Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017 

Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.

You should check out answers with reference to the legal position



Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 8646
Date:
Permalink Closed

What is worrying is that this kind of message will be putting off newbies and probably a lot of the regular viewers as it looks like the site either doesn't exist, is about to be deleted or is just plain dodgy!!

The advanced feature on the above message allows access. But it's not obvious.

Hopefully Steve will get his IT bods on it early doors this week to sort it.

__________________

 Joanne 

Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017 

Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.

You should check out answers with reference to the legal position



Expert

Status: Offline
Posts: 1811
Date:
Permalink Closed

Well, now, isn't this interesting.

Prompted by seeing posts to this thread in my feed, along I pop and I too get a big scary warning (using Palemoon on Linux).

Expanding on the detail, I see this:

bkncerterror.png

What that means is that the site is saying "I'm secure - here's my certificate" and the browser is saying "But you're
forum.bookkeepers.org, and that certificate is for *.activeboard.com - that's not you!"

And to confirm, glancing at the URL bar, the site is now on https (redirecting from http by the looks of it) - and clicking through to see
the certificate, it is indeed activeboard's.

I'm inclined to think, therefore, that someone is in the process of adding proper security to the site - perhaps prompted by this very
thread. I suspect the redirect is in place, but a proper certificate isn't yet, so the server is defaulting to the forum provider's. (But
don't quote me on that, because I'm just guessing!)

Edit: Added some line breaks because the large image posted upthread is making the posts stupidly wide.



-- Edited by VinceH on Sunday 30th of September 2018 06:09:36 PM

Attachments
__________________

Vince M Hudd - Soft Rock Software

(I only came here looking for fellow apiarists...)



Master Book-keeper

Status: Offline
Posts: 8646
Date:
Permalink Closed

Or we are being merged with the i c b forum. Worst nightmare for us, might be good for them.

 

wink



__________________

 Joanne 

Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017 

Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.

You should check out answers with reference to the legal position



Guru

Status: Offline
Posts: 1313
Date:
Permalink Closed

Still showing Not Secure apart from on my phone

__________________

Doug

These are only my opinions of how I see things and therefore should not be taken as advice

Page 1 of 1  sorted by
 
Quick Reply

Please log in to post quick replies.

Tweet this page Post to Digg Post to Del.icio.us
Members Login
Username 
 
Password 
    Remember Me  
©2007-2024 The Book-keepers Forum (BKF). All Rights Reserved. The Book-keepers Forum (BKF) is a trading division of Bookcert Ltd. Registered in England Company Number 05782923. 2 Laurel House, 1 Station Rd, Worle, Weston-super-Mare, North Somerset, BS22 6AR, United Kingdom. The Book-keepers Forum and BKF are trademarks of Bookcert Ltd. This forum is a discussion forum only. There will usually be more than one opinion to any question and any posting should not be viewed as a definitive solution. No responsibility for loss occasioned to any person acting or refraining from action as a result of any posting on this site is accepted by the contributors or The Book-keepers Forum. In all cases, appropriate professional advice should be sought before making a decision. We reserve the right to remove any postings which are offensive, libellous, self-promoting or engaged in covert marketing. We will not notify users of removals. The views expressed in the forum posts are those of the individual and do not necessary reflect or agree with those of The Book-keepers Forum. Any offensive or unsuitable posts will be removed by the moderators. Any reader of this forum can request for a post to be looked into by sending an email to: bookcertltd@gmail.com.

Privacy & Cookie Policy  About