Clinton, Rubio leading 2016 field — in website security

Hillary Clinton and Sen. Marco Rubio are leading the likely 2016 presidential field when it comes to website security, according to one analysis.

Clinton and Rubio (R-Fla.), who each announced presidential bids in the last 24 hours, won high marks from Web developer Paul Schreiber for automatically encrypting Web traffic to their campaign sites.

{mosads}Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas), on the other hand, do not direct users to a HTTPS-version campaign website by default.

Cruz’s encrypted site also does not work without the “www” at the beginning of the address. Schreiber called this a sign that the senator’s team “isn’t very good” at operating online, pointing to early technical stumbles for his campaign.

Encryption adds an additional layer of security to Web browsing by ensuring that snoopers cannot monitor traffic.

Taking this step is seen as a crucial measure of an organization’s seriousness online. The White House, after encrypting its own traffic last month, is pushing for all federal agencies to do the same.

“So, you want to run a country. Can you hire someone who can run a website? These days, that means all new sites, whether running the government or delivering news should be built over HTTPS,” Schreiber, who works for data site FiveThirtyEight, wrote Sunday in a blog post.

The post also inventoried the content delivery networks, mail servers and other aspects of the four declared candidates’ sites.

Rubio and Cruz registered their domain names through GoDaddy, Clinton used Network Solutions, while Paul used Fabulous.com, for example.