In an era, where nearly most of the sites have finally adopted HTTPS, which leads to a safer and more secure connection over the internet, there are still some using the HTTP protocol. To combat these sites, Google Chrome would now alert its users if the site they are visiting is not HTTPS but just plain old HTTP.
This new feature is going to roll out with the new Chrome 68 and is expected to work straight away. Through this update, every time you visit an HTTP website, you will be “greeted” with a Not Secure image in the URL or Address Bar. Since HTTPS sites are secured, this update won’t affect them.
The new feature was first announced in February with Google giving a roll-out month at that time of July. This is a part of Google’s mission to make the more safe and secure through higher encryption levels. Though, websites which require you to log in and didn’t have HTTPS protocol, have been labeled as Not Secure since 2016. Now it has extended this to all HTTP sites. To further combat the problems of weak encryption, sites which have HTTPS protocol are given an edge in search rankings over non-HTTPS sites since 2014.
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Since the purpose of nearly every site is to top the Google’s Search Rank, it is a great incentive for people to adopt HTTPS.
Google announced the new feature through a blog post stating that it is “a milestone for Chrome security.”
For the layman, it should be known that through HTTPS, your connection is made secure between you and the website you are visiting. Therefore, anyone who might be eavesdropping will have a hard time to steal your info. It is known that websites which aren’t secure are more prone to malware attacks, mostly by low-level cybercriminals.
It looks like it is just a matter of time before everyone would adopt HTTPS since it is mostly available free these days anyway. Though for that, you have to use content distribution networks like Cloudflare or public service projects like Let’s Encrypt. The growth has been phenomenal since HTTPS pages are up to 84 percent, right now, where there was just less than fifty percent back in July 2015.
