Your Site is Not Encrypted..or is it? Wait! Is It?

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Security

We've recently implemented SSL on our website.  Prior to that we didn't offer SSL because we felt it caused our site more problems than it solved.  Happily, we've resolved those issues and SSL is now in place. What is SSL and why did we take so long adding it to our site? If you want the answers, read on. If you're just happy SSL is there now, you can take the quick way out and stop reading here!

SSL stands for Secure Socket Layers. It's a method of securing through scrambling and descrambling Internet data passing between a sender and a receiver.  Many people access the web today using wireless devices, such as phones, tablets and laptops. Any wireless connection requires the information being sent to the web to travel through the air to some sort of receiver--like radio signals from the broadcast tower to your radio.  These signals can very easily be intercepted without anyone knowing it. Any data passing through the air could thus be read by people who don't have your best interests in mind. Of particular concern are user names and passwords to email and banking sites and credit card information. Armed with this information a hacker could engage in identity theft and cause immense trouble for their victim.

SSL scrambles the data using encryption techniques. Anyone who tries to intercept it will see useless scrambled junk unless they also possess the key to descramble it. The beauty of SSL is that it uses unique keys for each connection, making a snooper's job virtually impossible.  You can tell when SSL is active on a site two ways. By far the most common way is by the appearance of a small lock icon to the left of the site address in your browser's address bar window. The second way is a little older. Instead of seeing HTTP://6060eyes.com you'll see HTTPS://6060eyes.com. The added S means "Secured." That a website like 6060eyes.com which engages in e-commerce would need SSL would appear to be a no-brainer, but that is not always the case.

6060eyes.com doesn't collect or store credit card information on our site.  Anyone who fills out a shopping cart and proceeds to checkout finds that PayPal is our only option for payment online. Why? Because Paypal's entire business is about securing online payments. While 6060eyes.com didn't offer SSL while you browsed our site, you have always been secured during checkout and payment by PayPal. It's what they do and it's why we use them. You don't even need a PayPal account. You can use PayPal's guest checkout features just like many other e-commerce sites.

This is not to say that 606eyes.com did not secure your user account and login information. We always have.  It's just that we used encryption and security features other than SSL that the browsers didn't consider. Our database secures your password--even our site admin cannot read them, and all your shopping cart and address information is communicated to PayPal across a secure connection.  So now you may be wondering: If my logins and account passwords are secured, and my connection to PayPal is secured and my credit card payment data is secured, then why did you add SSL to your site?

In an effort to combat online scam sites, many browsers now include a feature that warns visitors when a site is deemed not secure. Basically, these features looked for SSL and if they didn't see it, your site was flagged as insecure and a risk. This was a vexing issue for 6060eyes.com because the most vital need for SSL was at checkout rather than just browsing our site, and we've always had SSL protection for that part of your visit.  Even without any non-SSL security a hacker might figure out you want to order 5 pairs of 12mm brown eyes, but they couldn't do much else!  However, you want to crochet! You don't have time to worry about this stuff. If your browsers says the site is not safe, you may be inclined to move on. We certainly don't want that. Our visitors were being scared away under the impression their payment security was at risk, and it simply wasn't true. So what would happen if somebody could hack your 6060eyes.com account and access our site as if they were you?

The  worst they could do is mischief we can easily fix, such as log in as you and alter your profile address or password, post a comment in our blog section or post a review in your name. They could fill out a shopping cart and load it as high as they want, but they could not do much more with it. They could not complete an order in your name and charge it to you on our site or any other website using just the data stolen from 6060eyes.com. That's because the order could not be completed without also having access to your PayPal account and the credit card data stored there. PayPal stores and secures that information separately from 6060eyes.com. Without it there is no way to run up a bill on our site or charge items from other sites to your name.

So there you have it! You've stuck with this article all the way to the end! Congratulations! We hope it helps explain what SSL is and how it helps. Now get out there and start crafting and know you're now protected by SSL whenever you visit 606eyes.com!

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