Thanks for the idea. I deleted the "s", hit (enter), and found that the page refreshed and put the "s" back in.
It's "no skin off my nose," but I am just curious why someone would design a website this way. Am I correct that unnecessary SSL encryption can slow down performance in accessing the page? Why else would someone do it?
If you look e.g. at www.vanguard.com, you will see that some pages are http (general information) and some are https (the one that asks for user login).
Maybe the designers of the other pages are just careless, and put SSL in unnecessarily?
Can you give us a URL of a page that is using SSL encryption unnecessarily?
Most browsers will (should) poup a warning when you go from a SSL page to non-SSL. Encrypting all pages, even if they don't need it, keeps the user from having to dismiss the popup as they move around.