Programming

SSL Certificates – Its Need and Importance for Security

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Electronic devices today have become as necessary to us as breathing is to life. From paying bills to booking cabs, it’s a part of our everyday life support system. And all this is possible because of the devices which connect us to the internet. Every moment thousands of bytes of data is transmitted from one system to other. Most of the time the information is sensitive and sometimes contain personal details too including debit/credit card details. The priority hence, in this case, becomes safe and secure transmission of information, which is done by a standard technology called Secure Socket Layer or SSL.

Some Key Points about SSL Certificate

  • SSL or Secure Sockets Layer encrypts the data that is exchanged between two systems (a server and a client) making it impossible for hackers to read and modify the information in it
  • The encryption is done through an algorithm that scrambles the data while transmitting hence making it difficult for an external user to consolidate and exploit the information.
  • When a website is secured by an SSL certificate HTTPS (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure) appears in the URL.

SSL Certification and How it Works

Having an SSL certificate is necessary for an SSL connection to establish. While creating an SSL connection, you will be asked for your details like your domain name, the name of your company, address, city, state, and country. Up next, two cryptographic keys will be generated a Private key and Public key. After the generation of the keys, the following steps take place in the sequential order.

  • The user requests the browser to make a secure connection to the target website. The browser then obtains the IP and DNS addresses and requests for a secure connection. For server identification, the browser asks for a copy of its SSL certificate to be sent to the browser.
  • The browser checks the certificate, and if it confirms the site can be trusted, then it creates a symmetric session key which it encrypts with the public key in website’s certificate.
  • The private key of the web server is used to decrypt the symmetric session key.
  • Acknowledgment is sent from the server which is encrypted with session key.
  • A secure connection is established for any communication between server and browser.

To verify whether SSL protocol is enabled, check on the address bar. If the website is indicated with a lock icon, the site is SSL certified.

Every website needs SSL Cert do read this recommended, Top 5 Checks before Buying SSL Certificate

If you are looking to buy SSL Certificate India, make sure to go through the following checklist:

  • Know the security level of the Certificate Authority
  • Knowledge about the server platform
  • Go through all the SSL reviews
  • Checking of the SSL expiry
  • Provision of technical support by the Certificate Authority

All the certifications come with a warranty that ensures your money is put to proper use. The importance of SSL certification can be understood from the fact when Google recently announced JULY as the deadline for websites getting SSL certified post which “not secure” will be displayed for non-certified ones.

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