Important notification about SSL offerings

Starting on September 1st, 2020 SSL/TLS certificates can't be issued for longer than 13 months (397 days). This is an industry wide change that effects all Certificate Authorities.

The reason for shorter SSL certificate validity periods

Visitors consider their communication secure when they see that their traffic is encrypted through HTTPS with an SSL certificate. The change to shorter validity periods will help maintain visitor's confidence in the security of SSL encryption.

• Faster adoption of the latest security technology – Long validity periods mean older and less secure certificates can exist for years before being updated. With the shorter validity periods, visitors will know that the encryption protecting them is no more than a year old.
• Greater visitor confidence that the site is legitimate – In two years, a lot can change with the individual or company that owns a web site. Now, a visitor will know that it’s been less than a year since the site owners had to verify their identity and ownership of the site.

What does shorter SSL validity mean for website owners?

If you’re using a two-year certificate that was issued before September 1st, your certificate will stay valid until its original expiration date. However, any certificates that are issued on or after September 1st will need to be renewed every year to remain valid.

If you have a two-year certificate and reissue it through a re-key or you move hosting providers, the maximum validity period is one year.

What’s Heart Internet doing to help?

You can continue to purchase longer term subscription plans and reissue certificates as long as they're within the maximum allowed validity period. Heart Internet is also creating certificate lifecycle automation features and subscription plans that will make certificate management easier for shorter certificate lifecycles.

In a nutshell, you can purchase an SSL subscription for an extended time period and then we take care of reissuing and installing your certificate each year.

Article ID: 1437
Created On: Wed, Dec 2, 2020 at 7:04 PM
Last Updated On: Wed, Dec 2, 2020 at 7:04 PM

Online URL: https://www.heartinternet.uk/support/article/important-notification-about-ssl-offerings.html