HTTPS and Custom Domains
HTTPS and Custom Domains
What is the difference between HTTP and HTTPS?
HTTP stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol.
It is the acronym to describe the ‘protocol’ or agreed way of communication which is being used between a browser and the website the browser is accessing.
Data travelling between a browser and the website server is in plain text, which means that people capturing that information can easily see the communication. For sensitive information like credit cards, or maybe even email addresses and other personal information, this is a security risk.
HTTPS stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure.
If you see https in a URL, the session between the web server and the browser on the mobile device you are using is encrypted.You can easily identify web servers that have https configured by looking at the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) in the web address bar of your browser.
The additional S in HTTPS stands for ‘secure’.
To be able to use HTTPS, there is a certification process. You will be required to get an official certificate from one of the authorized certificate authorities. The certificate is like the ID card of your site.
Technically, HTTPS uses two different protocols, called SSL (Secure Socket Layer) and TLS (Transport Layer Security)
TLS is an authentication and security protocol widely implemented in browsers and Web servers. SSL works by using a public key to encrypt data transferred over the SSL connection. Practically all web browsers support SSL. It allows you to communicate securely with the web server.
What are the benefits of HTTPS in my domain?
HTTPS has 3 huge advantages.
Benefit #1 of HTTPS:
Security with secure web communications and privacy
Indeed, it seems rather obvious. As explained earlier, the data transmitted between your browser and the server hosting the website you are visiting is encrypted, and gives you additionally also data integrity (data cannot be tampered with without being detected) and authentication.
Benefit #2 of HTTPS:
Speed and faster load times
A lesser known effect of using HTTPS instead of HTTP for your websites is that it will speed up the connectivity between your website and the browser, resulting in a faster experience for your visitors.
The speed increase is a result of skipping the filtering and scanning steps that happen with communication over HTTP and avoiding the data transfer that goes with those steps.
Communications over HTTPS are already certified and recognized as secure and are directly tunneled to the user.
The increase in speed is quite significant. Feel free to test it out yourself with this htt
ps speed tester.
HTTP vs HTTPS -
speed tester
Benefit #3:
improved SEO and higher search rankings
Google has officially confirmed
in 2014 already that HTTPS is a ‘ranking signal’ Admittedly, it does not count as strong as having high-quality content, but it will help you stand out. And Google did confirm that they would increase the importance of HTTPS as a ranking signal moving forward (that was back in 2014).
Tests done by companies such as MOZ
do confirm that HTTPS has become more and more important as a ranking signal.How do I get HTTPS on my custom domain?
Here is how you can setup an A-graded HTTPS security on Readz.
The first step is
setting up your custom domain
for your Readz content. See here how to set that up.
Next, you should contact us (support@readz.com
) and tell us the domain you want to give HTTPS to.
We will make it easy for you and get the needed SSL certificate. The certification authority we use is Symantec
. Symantec is a key player in the field of online security.
As part of this procedure,you will receive an email from Symantec asking you to confirm that we are allowed to use SSL on a subdomain of your domain. This email will be addressed to the technical contact this is associated with your domain. If you do not know this email address, we can help you get that address.
IMPORTANT NOTE
: Readz is not asking for full control of your domain. Symantec will ask to confirm that you have full control and will ask to give us right to use the domain only for the certificate and just to place the SSL certificate on the subdomain URLs created on Readz.
If you have any questions or concerns about this feature, feel free to contact us at support@readz.com
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