SSL Certificates

SSL Certificates

Promoting your security levels and making your customers feel safe is paramount to installing customer trust and encouraging sales. In such times of online fraud and data breach, conveying to your online customers your levels of protection can bring about higher visitor to customer conversions.

Secure Socket Layer (SSL) is an international standard for encrypted network communication; it was conceived in 1994 by Netscape and is supported by all major international web browsers.

The Domain SSL is a quick issuance SSL Certificate with true 128bit - 256bit strong encryption. Trusted by all browsers and devices, this SSL Certificate can be issued within minutes, without the annoyance of paperwork and administration.

Domain SSL certificates portray to your online users your company’s level of encryption with the display of the “little yellow padlock.” This will appear during ecommerce transactions, web account logins, webmail, network traffic and online services within minutes.

The Organisation SSL Certificate is a highly trusted and traditionally vetted strong security SSL Certificate with true 128bit - 256bit encryption. This SSL Certificate will authenticate your online services with unsurpassed levels of authentication, integrity, confidentiality and non-repudiation.

Organisation SSL Certificates are organisation vetted - meaning that website visitors see your vetted company details, enhancing the trust they place in your website and providing more confidence to do business with you.

The highest level of SSL certification offered by GlobalSign is the Extended Validation SSL certificate. The EV SSL will turn your users address bar green and confirm your company details, along with your Site Seal profile. The Extended Validation SSL Certificate provides enhanced trust, which means enhanced sales, turning browsing visitors into paying customers. As used by Virgin Atlantic, BT Shop, Zurich and more.

Wildcard SSL can be applied to both Domain SSL and Organization SSL to secure unlimited subdomains. By adding the Wildcard SSL option you can save time, administration and money with the easy management of all of

Instead of the usual single fixed subdomain of standard SSL Certificates, the Wildcard SSL can apply SSL certificates to *.domain.co.uk, with the * character allowing the Certificate to be used on any number of different subdomains.

SSL security levels vary depending upon the way an SSL certificate is installed onto a server, as well as the configuration used. SSL is simple to use, although its security can be compromised if basic installation and configurations are not completed to a competent level. Hackers are then able to decrypt the security on a badly installed SSL certificate.

At Business Internet Consultant, we recommend that all data collection forms are placed behind a well configured SSL certificate. This includes enquiry forms, product information forms, login areas and email request forms, to protect your data for your business. It is a requirement for PCI DSS compliance for a website to have an SSL certificate if your site takes online payments.

The type of website in question will determine if having a well configured and installed SSL certificate is enough. In our opinion it is the starting point to maintaining high security levels, and is highly recommended if any form of ecommerce or mission critical data collection occurs on the website that you wish to meet with todays recommended data security standards – See our PCI DSS compliance section for further information.

The SSL server certificate is often the weakest point of any SSL server configuration. If a certificate is shown as not trusted (not signed by a well known certificate authority like GlobalSign) it may fail to prevent man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks, and would effectively render the SSL useless. Incorrect certificates or expired certificates can erode trust and customer confidence in your website, removing credibility from your organisation and allowing competitors to take potential and existing clients away from you.

Common SSL Certificate Issues are:

• URL / Domain name mismatch
• The certificate has expired
• The certificate is self signed – no credibility
• Certificate has been revolved
• A non-trusted or unknown certificate authority
• Certificate not valid

  The three main points when installing and setting up an SSL certificate on a server are:

• Protocol Support
• Key Exchange
• Cipher Strength

If you are concerned about the strength, setup and configuration of your website’s SSL certificate, this can be completed free of charge on websites such as www.ssllabs.com. SSLLabs .com is operated by Qualys, a reputable global website security company. (We believe your SSL should be rated as an ‘A’ on Qualys ssllabs.com tester, if not you need to ask yourself, why?)

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SSL Certificates

SSL Certificates are an essential part of any website that protect customer data and information all websites should have one