In order to make internet safer for all users, since January 2017, when Chrome 56 came out, Google defines all websites that are not in http as “not secure” (as it was announced back in September of 2014). The page will have the same red indication as does a broken page.
What will be the results of this change?
First and foremost, this change will affect websites whose owners strive to acquire a good position in Google results. Google will reward https websites which means that they will rank higher in its results than websites that do not have SSL (active security protocol).
Furthermore, the warning defining the website as not secure will confuse a lot of the site’s visitors as they will believe that are as an imminent security breach in the site (other than not having an active SSL) and deciding eventually not to visit the site.
Websites requiring the insertion of password and debit/credit cards number will be the first to be affected by this change. In a following Google Chrome update all websites visited with incognito mode will be defined as secure or not. The final goal is that all non-https websites will be defined as “not secure”.
Why change your website to https and what are its advantages?
Google may have specified that the reason behind this change is to guarantee the users safety when they browse the web but that does not mean that https does not have other advantages over http. Let’s take a look at them:
Website security no matter its content
Higher ranking in Google
Users personal data protection
Page characterization as secure
Conclusions and what you must do?
As it is made clear it is of crucial importance to change your website into https format (if you have not done it already). This mean that you must contact your website developer and request the immediate insertion of the proper SSL type (depending on every website’s needs), in order to make your website defined as secured!
In SmartWebDesign we make sure that all the websites we create are in https and that they always fulfill the latest security requirements!
