You may have overheard techie conversations in a coffee shop. You know the scene…a couple of people with laptops and many venti, extra-shot lattes spattering off geek speak jargon like it’s a second language (or third if you count Klingon). Blah blah secure, blah blah https.
The time has come to sit up and take notice because secure is the new normal. Google says so and concerned users are taking it to the social media streets. Let us explain.
The first question – is your website secure? Take a moment and browse to it now. Do you see https in the URL? That little letter ‘s’ is the critical factor here. If you don’t have it, things are only going to get tougher.
The Right Now
Chrome started the trend, and other major browsers have followed on, to provide a visual indication of NOT SECURE in the URL bar on non secure pages with login or payment information. It looks like this:
On pages without login or payment information, the browser shows the information icon and, when clicked, tells the user that the site is not secure. It looks like this:
The Coming Soon
Google has promised that with the release of Chrome 62 in October 2017, all unsecured websites with form fields will show a “Not secure” warning. Let’s ponder that for a moment.
Does your site have search box? It will display as Not Secure.
Does your site have a newsletter signup with an email address field? It will show display as Not Secure.
In Incognito Mode, ALL pages and ALL unsecured sites will show Not Secure.
The Inevitable
Google has promised that with future releases of Chrome all pages on all unsecured sites with show the Not Secure indicator. They are giving you time to act and we suggest not waiting.
User have already taken to social media outlets such as Twitter to shame websites that have not gone secure. Check out these site not secure shaming tweets!
The Solution
If you need help learning about how to secure your site and making the necessary changes to Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and other tools, please contact us immediately. We are here to help!
Get your green lock today!