Dear letter writer:

MIT's process for asking letters of recommendation is designed to make submitting a letter as painless as possible and to avoid spam filters deleting requests for letters. To achieve these goals we ask the applicant to email you the link to submit a letter. Emails from the applicant are more likely to reach you. The applicant has a real incentive to communicate the link to you. You are also likely to believe an email from an applicant for whom you are writing a letter.

The link sent to you by the applicant is unique for each letter writer and applicant pair. It is safe to click on the link, because https combined with the SSL certificate for gradapply.mit.edu should convince you that your browser will securely connect to the MIT EECS's graduate admission system. Once you are connected, you can click on the lock icon for the link to inspect the certificate. The scrambled part of the link is a hash of identifiers for the applicant and the letter writer.

Although the applicant knows the link, the applicant will not be able to read your letter. The system records submitted letters but doesn't reveal them.

Some commercial systems send an email to you with a link, a login name, and a password (or ask you to create an account). MIT's approach is equivalent to that approach but less work for you.