Starting with version 68 of Google Chrome, all websites without SSL (that is, https in the address bar), will show a ‘Website Not Secure warning’. 

This can have a severe impact on consumers, having a detrimental effect on their trust in your website. There is good reason behind Google enforcing this, of course.

With HTTP, it’s possible for a third-party to read information transmitted between your website and anyone visiting it. HTTPS is the same protocol, but employs encryption to hide your data as it is transferred from your computer to the server.

As opposed to plain text, hackers can only see a bunch of jumbled up letters and numbers that mean nothing and can’t be deciphered.

Hence, Google has introduced this warning to ensure people do not enter sensitive information on websites without an SSL Certificate and HTTPS – keeping you secure online!

Google will also rank your website lower (that is, penalise it) for not being secure. Regardless of SEO optimisation, your website will fare negatively compared to the competition, who might not have SEO optimised websites, purely due to the lack of SSL.

Of course, on top of all this, SSL keeps your customers secure on your website, and reassures them that their information is secure. This isn’t just crucial for ecommerce websites and websites handling payment information, but for any website, to keep users payment history safe from prying eyes.

Don’t fret though – all our websites include SSL as standard.