I still don't understand why you don't just turn on some sort of webserver authorization for the directory you place the files in. That would solve your problem with exactly 0 lines of code...

--
$you = new YOU;
honk() if $you->love(perl)

can you be more specific? The only thing I know how to do on the server is set permissions on files/directories using the NT interface... but like I said if I restrict access to that directory, I can't link to it either.

Does your webserver support .htaccess files? It probably does. If so, you can use the browser to enforce the password, and not worry about having any code on your side do it. Just search the web for .htaccess and you'll find a ton of tutorials.

Note that the password would still be sent in plain text, but you said you aren't bothered by that.

could you be more specific? I know how to set up file permissions within NT but like I said before if I restrict a file or directory my calling file can't get to it either.