HTTPS

HTTPS is the protected version of a web address, and the letters sit right at the front of the link. Your browser shows a small padlock beside them to say that the messages between a visitor and your website are scrambled the whole way. That is why nobody sitting on the same wi-fi can read a password, a card number or an order as it goes past.

The padlock rests on a small file called an SSL certificate, which lives on the server holding your site. That file does two jobs, and the first is to show a visitor really reached your address and not a copy someone built to catch logins. The second is to hand over the key that scrambles the conversation between the two. Most certificates now cost nothing and are issued in about two minutes, which is why almost every site has one.

This is where people are misled, because the padlock says nothing at all about the business behind the site. It does not mean the shop is real, that the goods will arrive, or that anyone will answer the phone. A fraud site gets the same padlock in the same two minutes, free, and almost all of them do. It promises a private line, not an honest person at the other end, so judge a shop by its address, phone number and returns policy.

Without a certificate, browsers print the words Not secure next to your address and search engines push the page down. The bigger trouble, though, is renewal. Certificates expire, usually after ninety days or a year, and they renew by themselves until the day they quietly stop. That happens because the server moved, the domain changed hands, or someone switched off the job that does the renewing. Every visitor then meets a red warning page saying your site is dangerous, so sales stop that morning rather than fading gradually. Linkysoft watches the expiry date on every site it looks after, because this failure arrives with no warning email.

So ask whoever hosts your site who renews the certificate, and who is told the day a renewal fails. On Hostrena hosting the renewal runs on its own and the alert goes out before a visitor sees anything. When Linkysoft finishes a website build, HTTPS is on for every page and the old http addresses point at the new ones. That last part matters, because an old link sitting in someone's email still needs to land in the right place.