SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer and is a technology used to encrypt data being transmitted between your visitors and the servers in order to prevent eavesdropping. This is particularly crucial when sensitive information such as credit card numbers or passwords are being entered on your website, as is often the case for online stores, contact forms, or password-protected sections. Sites secured by an SSL certificate will show a padlock in the address bar and may choose to display a special site seal to certify that data transmissions are protected.

If you sell items online, have password-protected sections on your website, host online forms requesting personal information, or send sensitive emails from your domain, you are strongly encouraged to obtain an SSL certificate. Not only will this enhance your account’s security, it will increase the level of trust your visitors have in your website, and will often result in increased conversion rates and sales.

As of January 2015, Google has also started using SSL protection as a ranking algorithm for its search engines. As a result, a website with an SSL certificate will rank higher than a similar website without one. As such, we strongly recommend all website owners to seriously consider protecting their entire site with SSL, regardless of the type of activity being conducted.

Premium SSL are great and affordable entry-level certificates that provides strong 256-bit encryption for a single subdomain (for example www.yourdomain.com or secure.yourdomain.com). They are the recommended certificate for most websites and web shops with less than 50,000$ of online transactions per year.

The WildCard SSL provides the same strong 256-bit encryption but over an unlimited number of subdomains (so anything.yourdomain.com can be secured). This is great for multi-lingual or multi-currency online shops using multiple subdomains. Furthermore, WildCard SSL require a more extensive validation of your identity and thus confers additional trust to your visitors.

The Enterprise EV SSL certificate is the most advanced certificate with includes Extended Validation and a dynamic seal, which shows your company’s name and address, as well as the certificate's validity period. If customer confidence is important to your site, EV certificates are the recommended choice. Sites using EV certificates have actually been shown to have higher conversion rates over sites with regular SSL certificates.

If your account is already hosted with Web Hosting Canada, our technicians will install your certificate on your account free of charge. Please note that all SSL certificates require a dedicated IP address (which may be ordered at the same time as your certificate for an added, yearly cost).

If you do not have an account with Web Hosting Canada, you will be charged a one-time fee if you require our technicians to perform the installation on your server. Please contact our team to confirm the details of your hosting environment before your purchase.

Depending on the certificate you choose, you may be asked to provide proof of your (or your business’) identity. These requests will be sent to you by email following your order, and it is important that you provide all the required justifications so that your certificate may be issued in a timely manner.

If you are using a simple HTML website, using your SSL certificate simply involves changing your links (or URLs) from “http” to “https”. All https pages will automatically be encrypted with your SSL certificate. If you are using a Content Management System (including E-Commerce applications), there will generally be an option in your settings allowing you to easily enable SSL.

If you require any assistance activating SSL settings on your website following an SSL certificate’s installation, please contact our friendly support team and we’ll be happy to assist.