Earlier this month, Google announced that any web site that doesn’t use a valid SSL certificate will be flagged as insecure (https://security.googleblog.com/2016/09/moving-towards-more-secure-web.html) within the upcoming Chrome version 56. Mozilla Firefox are following suit and have today released version 51 of Firefox which doesn’t go quite as far, but does flag up a warning message if the website allows users to log on but doesn’t use a valid SSL certificate ()https://blog.mozilla.org/security/).

I suspect that it won’t be long before other mainstream browsers such as Opera, IE and Edge follow suit. What this means for any website owner is that they should make plans to ensure that their sites are using an SSL certificate as soon as possible as Chrome accounts for 56% of the browser market and Firefox for about 12% (https://www.netmarketshare.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=0&qpcustomd=0)

If an SSl certificate is not installed, then there is a risk that your users may decide to leave your website and find a website that doesn’t have these warnings. This may have an impact on your business.