1 million e-commerce sites on the Internet

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Online commerce has reached an interesting milestone: over one million websites now use SSL to provide secure connections to public websites, according to Netcraft. Although the overall development of the Internet has shown signs of slowdown in recent months, the number of SSL sites has been growing steadily, reaching approximately 18,000 sites per month.

Websites use encryption to provide a secure connection between their web server and the end-user’s browser, allowing sensitive information such as credit card numbers to be transmitted securely for online transactions. Encryption is enabled by the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and Transport Layer Security (TLS) encryption protocols, which are implemented using SSL certificates that verify the identity of the website operator.

Since the introduction of SSL, Internet users have been encouraged to check for the “gold lock” icon in their browser to ensure that their Internet session is encrypted before conducting an e-commerce transaction. SSL certificates initially cost over $100 each, but in recent years their price has dropped dramatically as low-cost providers such as Go Daddy, GeoTrust, and Comodo have entered the market.

SSL certificates are purchased for many reasons. However, the vast majority of websites using SSL use it to ensure the security of retail transactions or online banking, which makes the number of websites using SSL a good indicator for tracking the development of online commerce.