Even though MITM is a very important attack vector, we've seen recently how the strength of the private key file encryption can overnight come under scrutiny of world-wide IT media (spoiler: Linode private key has a 'secure' password):
You have to keep in mind that Georgia Tech is one of the best engineering schools in the U.S. (disclosure: I am not in any way related to this institution) and consequently worldwide.
$15K AUD is very close to ~$14.5K USD. This is less than half of that.
Keep in mind that it is $6,600 for a graduate (post-Bachelors) degree, not a college degree.
In the U.S. a Bachelors degree lasts 8-9 semesters and equips you for work far better than the 3-year Bologna "equivalent."
The Masters degree thus can focus almost exclusively on the graduate-level courses, with the exception of some refreshers.
You have to compare the $6,600 to the cost of living in the United States.
U.S. census Bureau's poverty threshold is $11,500/year income. In this income-level very little goes to taxes. So this program is roughly 7 months of minimum wage in the US.
Please let me know if this applies in the case outside of being a PhD student.
The US educational system has a tradition of issuing a Masters as a consolation price to PhD dropouts who've done enough of the coursework/research.
Bona-fide Masters programs with scholarships/stipends are very hard to find. If there's counterexamples I would like to know about them. From my experience, these are very rare.
I disagree that MBAs have a negative value in the Silicon Valley. Most investors I know value someone having one business person on the team early on. This person can help drive the validation/marketing/sales side of the business plan forward. People with hybrid skills (MBA + engineering degree) are from my personal experience highly appreciated.
re: Second-class degree
Geogia Tech's engineering program ranks extremely high in the U.S. and the United States' academic institutions rank extremely high on various world-wide charts.
Having spent a long time on the inside track of the Silicon Valley hiring processes, I can vouch that getting a degree from a prestigious institution really does fast-track your interview, at least when it comes to the screening or pre-screening phase.
$6,600 will at the current engineering salaries be at most a month and a half of your future net salary in the USA, or about 4-5 months worth of rent in San Francisco, so it is overall a very small forward investment to make if you live in the US.
I doubt the degree will be treated as "second class," this will occur only if the words get out that the program is somehow easier to finish and I strongly doubt that. If anything, without in-person TA-ing and live peer interaction, it will be harder to complete some of the courses.
re: Cost of graduate-level education in the USA
I understand that EU-citizens get free Masters' education. This is somewhat a side-effect of the EU-wide Bologna process, which promoted everyone's Bachelors degree into a Masters by adding a year's worth more of education and introducing a credit-system. If you are a non-EU citizen trying to get a degree in the EU, you will be paying much more than $6600 in many countries, including the socialist-leaning Scandinavia.
Any US citizen can give FAFSA a try and (from memory) more than half of the undergraduate student body receives some form of financial aid from the government. There are reputable sources that say that paradoxically the generous FAFSA grants are partially responsible for a tuition inflation, but this debate is completely off-topic.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dangling_else