Every customer wants to have a secured access to a website and also want to know that whether the product and the services offered by them are authenticate or not. Therefore Security of your website plays an important role in converting the visitor’s into customers. If you want to provide a secured service to the customer’s then it is required to purchase an SSL Certificate.
From this overview we come to know that an SSL Certificate is required for the security of your website.
Now let’s see how does visitor’s identify whether your website is secured or not?
For Ex. Consider there is a website ABCD.com . First thing which you need to check is the site bar. If you find only HTTP:// ABCD.com that means the particular website is not secured.
One may ask what is HTTP?
HTTP is an abbreviation of “Hypertext Transfer Protocol”. This protocol was designed in early days as a way to communicate between your web browser and a web server. But then hacking became stronger and a lot of attack came out. The websites were also evolving and a lot of sensitive data was being transferred between the web browser and the web server. So something secure was needed because whatever information or sensitive data gets transferred in HTTP protocol, it travels in a clear text form. A lot of research was done and using interception tools important data of the customer can be picked up which is travelling through the protocol. Sensitive data like credit card information, login information and a whole bunch of valuable information that needs to be encrypted and also needs to be secured. HTTPS simply makes encryption. When valuable information is transferring from the browser to the web server then if hackers try to pick up this encrypted data then it is really hard for them to decrypt it. Thus HTTPS means the website is secured.
Let’s see how a HTTPS works?
It works on two protocols SSL and TLS. SSL is an abbreviation of Secured Socket Layer and TLS stands for Transfer Layer Security. Both of these uses PKI i.e. Public Key Infrastructure. Both of them are easy to use. PKI uses 2 keys Public Key and Private Key. A private key is a type of a code which is used with a Public Key in encryption and decryption of data or text. Both of these keys are used together for a secured communication between a web browser and a web server.
There are 2 types of SSL Certificates. 1. Regular and 2. Extended. When you visit any website related to financial transactions like bank, and if you see a whole green bar turned site bar with the name of the bank then it is an example of an extended certificate. If you see a lock icon or padlock icon then it is a Regular certificate.
Every website does not need an extended certificate but for the websites for banking requires more security and an extended version of an SSL certificate.
If your website has HTTPS means Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secured. It does not assure that the website is completely secured. It means that the communication between your browser and web server is now encrypted and so it is secured. There are some applications that can still access your data for ex. Site injection etc. For these kinds of attacks you need more preventive measures.
It is not compulsory that each and every website should have an SSL Certificate but if they are having it, then is good.
Let’s see how much cost is required for purchasing an SSL Certificate?
The most important thing that is required before purchasing an SSL Certificate is a dedicated IP address.
Dedicated IP addresses are very expensive to have. Also not all the hosting service providers are capable of installing an SSL Certificate. Installation of SSL Certificate is a very complex process. Therefore first make it sure whether it is possible with your hosting plan to install an SSL Certificate? There are various plans which comes with installation of an SSL Certificate.
If you think that you are not capable of purchasing a dedicated IP address then you can have an alternate way of securing your website. This alternate way can’t be a foolproof solution to this problem, but you can try it. Suppose lets think that your website handles various payment related transactions and it is not secured. Then you can take help of various payment services which provides API integrations in your website. You can host your website on a non secured channel i.e. HTTP and the at the time of any payment related transactions you can redirect your customer to another payment service which is secured i.e. HTTPS. Thus you can handle all the payment related transactions.
Many of you may want to know about who will provide an SSL Certificate?
There are many web hosting companies which provides you an SSL Certificate. Some of them provide it at high price and some of them provide it at affordable price. Hostdens is a Best Web Hosting company which provides an SSL Certificate at a cheap cost.
