UNIVERSITY PARK -- Penn State students who use an e-mail program such as Eudora or Outlook will have to reconfigure it today, if they have not already, to use a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption, said Kevin Morooney, senior director academic services & emerging technologies in Information Technology Services.

Students, faculty and staff who do not make the changes by today will not be able to access their e-mail, he said. Students can find instructions on reconfiguring their e-mail client to SSL at http://helpdesk.
psu.edu/email/sslconfig.html.

SSL encrypts e-mails to scramble user data. By converting an e-mail account to SSL, users eliminate the risk of sending their password or user ID over the Internet, Morooney said.

Without the protection of SSL, a hacker who has access to your e-mail account could have access to your personal information as well, he added.