Did you know that more than 95% of U.S. webpages loaded in Google Chrome are now encrypted? That’s good for websites and users. But not so good for the 5% that have not migrated from HTTP to HTTPS.
This article is part of our series of on-page experiences. It highlights why HTTPS is important for everyone, but especially so you can equip your webpages to qualify for a cork bicycle zone ranking boost in Google. A secure site is a ranking signal in Google’s page experience update that went live in mid-2021. (Tip: You’ll find more info on the page experience ranking factors at the end of this post.
What Is HTTPS?
HTTPS, or hypertext transfer protocol secure, secures the data that’s exchanged between a web browser (such as Chrome) and a web server (which stores, processes and delivers your webpages to a user).
As the illustration shows, the difference between HTTP and HTTPS is that the data is not encrypted on HTTP. HTTPS helps protect against attacks that can happen while data is in transit.
A breach of sensitive data like passwords, credit card numbers and health information
Malware installation onto the user’s computer
Fake content served up to the user instead of the content they wanted
Studying the overall browsing activities of users to ultimately discover a user’s identity
HTTPS came about in the ‘90s and originally applied to processing credit card information. But as companies like Google began to push for secure web browsing, HTTPS has become a gold standard for websites.
Google’s goal is to achieve 100% encryption across its products and services.