A safer web is enabled by SSL-protected sites, as seen with Facebook’s transition to requiring SSL for all applications and Google’s transition to the https standard for all logged-in searches. You may wonder exactly what SSL certificate security is. Well, SSL stands for Secure Socket Layer. This protocol is a standardized way to encrypt (i.e., scramble) online transmission. An SSL-secured site uses an encryption or algorithm to encode and decode data. The SSL system involves two individual keys, which are called the private key and the public key. Typically the public key is just that – available to all — whereas the private key is known only to the site owner.
Web sites with cheap SSL encryption start with https rather than http. In other words, SSL is so commonplace that it is built into the Web’s infrastructure and browser functionality. Https web sites require an active and site-specific SSL for data transfer; if the SSL is expired, for a different site, or not installed properly, error messages result. Typically, web sites used for online payment or digital transactions are secured through this encryption/decryption protocol, as are some email sites.
