Many website owners prefer to use a free SSL certificate for their domains. They understand the importance of SSL, especially after the Heartbleed bug that was recently discovered and patched.

SSL, also known as Secure Sockets Layers, is an invaluable part of any website’s security protocols. SSL allows your site to keep its users safe as they provide sensitive, personal data to your servers.

Whether you are running an ecommerce site, providing a new online shopping experience or just trying to improve your domain’s security and provide your visitors with some peace of mind, using a free SSL certificate is a great way to get your site moving in that direction.

As the de facto standard for security technology, SSL establishes encrypted links between the server and the client, or in other words, between you and your customers. This is most often a web server (represented by the website) and a web browser (this is usually the client representing the customer).

However, it could also be an encrypted link between a mail server and a mail client. A free SSL certificate is a great way to let your visitors know that you are taking the necessary measures to protect their data and keep them safe on the internet.

Because SSL lets your website’s visitors to enter personal, sensitive data such as social security numbers, credit cards, usernames, and passwords, the potential for success with an online platform is high, and most importantly, secure. Without SSL, all of this data would be sent to the server in plain text, just as plain as you are reading now.

This leaves your customers’ personal data vulnerable to sniffers: exploitative code that sniffs this data as it is travelling to the server or back to the client.

A free SSL certificate will show your visitors that you will not allow this to happen and that you keep them safe and secure.

To be more specific, SSL is a very important security protocol. These protocols provide the instructions for how specific algorithms should be used. As a security protocol, SSL creates the variables used for the encryption, not just for the data transferred but for the link as well.

Because SSL is responsible for securing millions of people’s sensitive and personal data everyday over the internet, users now connect their data’s security with the lock icon featured on websites secured with SSL. Aside from the lock icon, websites that are secured with extended validation SSL appear in a green address bar and the URL address begins with https instead of http.

With a free SSL certificate you can show your website visitors that you take their security seriously and prove to them that they can use your website and services without fear. This peace of mind allows more individuals to trust your website enough to become a loyal customer.

The SSL certificate eliminates the worry of having your identity stolen when you are trying to enjoy the website.