Websites and hosting
SSL certificate
A file installed on a web server that encrypts traffic between a visitor and the site, producing the padlock and the https address.
What sSL certificate means in practice
It does two things: it stops anything on the network between visitor and site from reading or altering what is sent, and it confirms the site is served by whoever controls the domain. Browsers now warn on pages without one, so it is a baseline rather than a feature.
The practical points are that certificates expire, usually every ninety days on modern free issuers, and that renewal should be automatic. A site that goes down with a browser warning on a Sunday has almost always had a renewal fail silently weeks earlier. Paid certificates are not more secure than free ones for an ordinary business site: the encryption is identical.
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