When you connect to a regular, unsecure site, data is sent in a simple, easy-to-read plain text design. This information usually rebounds between several repositories before it meets its target, so there are several ways for a possible data hacker to intercept and decrypt this information. This is amplified by using public Wi-Fi that often imparts unencrypted data over the airways to a wireless router.
This is a major security issue when signing on to websites, making a purchase through credit cards or linking to your workstation. This is where Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption comes into effect. This system encrypts data between your Internet browser and the SSL-protected webpage, so you can be confident that the information cannot be accessed even though it is being intercepted.
Understanding HTTP vs HTTPs
As far as security is concerned, HTTP is quite safe when surfing the internet. It just becomes a problem when you insert confidential data in the form fields on the website. If you enter confidential data on the HTTP web page, the data is distributed in plain text and can be interpreted by anybody.
If connection is not secure (HTTP), attackers may possess confidential data, such as username and payment information, or insert malicious code into the requested services. Potential network attacks can occur any place with an unauthenticated router or ISP.
Consequently, every public WiFi network is susceptible to attacks. Luckily, the wider populace seems to understand this fact (increasing the use of VPNs). However, the responsibility of keeping everyone’s web experience healthy is and should always land on the shoulders of webmasters. This is where the implementation of HTTPs comes into effect.
HTTPs encrypts HTTP requests/responses making it safe to insert sensitive information. This means an attacker positioned to intercept will only see random characters rather than credit card info, for instance.
A simple analogy to understanding how HTTPs functions would be like forwarding valuables in an invulnerable sealed combination package. Only the sender and receiver knows the combination, and even if the attackers get their hands to it, they can’t open it.
How Do You Check for HTTPs?
You can easily check status codes, response headers, and redirect chains by going to https://httpstatus.io/ This can be your favorite tool for monitoring HTTP status codes, particularly multiple URLs at once. It comes with sophisticated features, intuitive UX capability and stable performance.
Likewise, you can scan your website for non-secure content by visiting https://www.jitbit.com/sslcheck/ This free tool scans the entire HTTPs-website sequentially, following internal links and looks for unsecure images, scripts and css-files that will prompt an alert message in the browser. The number of pages scanned is limited to 400 per domain. Meanwhile, results are preserved as cache for 10 minutes.
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