Secure Server / Certificates
Let’s start by saying we supply secure (SSL) hosting and install certificates from reputable vendors (we use Godaddy). An example of this is free2list.ca.
If you’re not familiar with it, a secure server is encrypted for traffic, meaning that the conversation between your computer and the server that hosts the website is “coded”. That means that if someone was “listing-in”, they could not understand what was being sent from one to another. Imagine someone’s punching-in their credit card number or a password to a site – that’s better to have coded – yes?!
To make a site secure, a digital “certificate” is purchased and installed on the server for that website. It’s not unlike a domain name in that you pay periodically and have to renew it to keep it. Here’s one place you can buy them: https://ca.godaddy.com/web-security/ssl-certificate
This is very important to have for websites that sell and take online payments to be secure – for obvious reasons. Likewise, passworded sites (those sites with log-ins etc.) may also benefit from being secure.
an example of a site that does have a security cert and therefore encrypts the data between you, the site and the server – meaning you can enter info more safely – the lock symbol shows this and can be clicked on for more info.
However, a brochure site (who we are, what we do and here are our products to view) does not have secret information being transmitted and therefore may not benefit from being secure.
A secure site does lend some legitimacy to the owner/publisher as there is a verification process involved in getting the certificate. Also, Google is showing what is and what is not a secure site on their Chrome browser URL bar as of July 2018 – so the thing to consider is “will a user be turned-off if what I am showing is ‘not secure'”.
This “not secure” shows on recent versions of Google Chrome and means the data is not encrypted when it communicates with the server – so you should not put sensitive info in (like credit cards etc.)
There’s a lot of scare-mongery going-on right now about this subject. The https push is being led by Google and they do have huge pull in the industry. VRB.ca is not secure and probably won’t be for a while (it’s a brochure – there’s nothing to secure) because there’s little benefit. Our log-in page and associated systems are (passwords are being used, systems provided etc.) secure obviously. That’s what we think, that’s what we’re doing.
So – decide if it’s a big deal for you, then let us know what you want to do. SSL certificates range from about $50 to $150 a year and hosting costs increase about 30% annually. There’s a set-up fee to get it all going which depends on the complexity and platform of your site.