Encryption provides competitive benefits
New industry standards are paving the way for encryption, users are becoming increasingly aware of padlocks and the search engines are rewarding secure and fast links with better rankings. The time for your business to start using encryption is here.
2017.12.11
SSL/TLS Certificate for protection Government data
In Norway, the Agency for Public Management and e-Government (Difi) recommends encryption and the use of StartTLS in all public-sector e-mail communication. Barack Obama and The White House have adopted an equivalent initiative; they have decided that all public-sector websites in the US must be secured using HTTPS.
At Buypass we are pleased that the public sector is taking security seriously. When processing sensitive data, for example about the country’s citizens, it is extremely important to use HTTPS/TLS to secure the data and to establish trust between the state and the citizen.
Encryption will be the norm
Given the huge range of digital products we now interact with, it is more important than ever that enterprises and providers are conscious of their responsibility for privacy. The use of HTTPS/TLS protects privacy in a dependable manner, and SSL/TLS certificates are well-suited for identifying a website, by service or service provider. Use of SSL/TLS certificates provides end users with a simple means of checking that the website they are visiting has been verified by a trusted third party. This creates trust between you the provider and your customers/users.
HTTPS is in the process of becoming a key international industry standard. The Internet Architecture Board states that encryption must be the norm. The Tor Project and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who are both committed to online privacy, have jointly developed a special plug-in for current browsers, to give internet users access to HTTPS for websites that support the protocol.
Downgrading the user experience for unencrypted content
It is now also likely that some browsers, with Mozilla and Google at the forefront, will identify HTTP links as insecure and, as a result, downgrade the user experience for unencrypted content. This will apply in particular when we transition to HTTP/2 – a new version of the HTTP protocol which will provide faster, more streamlined access to online services.
A number of industry participants, again with Google and Mozilla leading the way, believe that the only secure way to deploy this new protocol on the open internet is to use encryption. For this reason, neither Chrome nor Firefox will support HTTP/2 without the TLS encryption technology also being used. Search engines such as Google have already decided to give higher ranking to websites running HTTPS.
It is therefore not just sensitive data that should be secured by encryption. Ultimately, it is the responsibility of the website owner to protect business-critical data, customers and users. By encrypting your enterprise’s website, you ensure better visibility, a more secure experience for users and customers, and, not least, a competitive benefit in the form of the trust you earn as a service provider. We call this a win-win and encourage everyone to get on board with encryption – sooner rather than later.