'Net Features : GlobalSign

GlobalSign Accelerates SSL-Certified Pages

Michael Garrity — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 16:15:00 GMT

One of the world’s largest SSL certificate providers, GlobalSign, has partnered with Web performance and security company CloudFlare to significantly accelerate the load speeds and reduce the geographical delay of SSL-secured Web pages. And best of all, this speedy service comes at no additional charge or configuration requirements for GlobalSign customers.

After integrating the technology of these companies, GlobalSign has been able to increase load speeds by as much as six times that of traditional SSL. The hope is that by noticeably improving the performance of SSL-secured Web pages, the company will foster wider acceptance and adoption of SSL certificates that help Web businesses reduce the risk of data breaches, compromised sites and, most important, customer identity theft and fraud. Of course, it also helps that faster performing websites tend to increase customer loyalty and diminish site abandonment rates.

Historically, many sites have refrained from implementing SSL on their sites outside of their login or checkout pages out of a fear that it would disrupt the end-user experience. But now, as a result of its collaboration with CloudFlare, when browsers visit GlobalSign-protected websites, they can validate the certificates much quicker. This is because of CloudFlare’s network of 23 global datacenters that reduce the amount of time it takes a Certificate Authority (CA) SSL to deliver an SSL certificate’s validity status to the browser.

In addition, this CloudFlare’s international network provides resilience to distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks to protect GlobalSign Online Certificate Status Protocol (OCSP) services, which indicate the validity status of its SSL certificates.

But that’s not all in the way of recent news for GlobalSign. Earlier this week, the company announced the general availability of its new (and free) SSL Configuration Checker online service that lets website administrators confirm that their SSL is configured correctly across all of their websites; the service even provides actionable insights and guidance on how they can fix any questionable or exploitable configurations, as well.

When SSL is accurately configured, it dramatically improves the performance of the website and strengthens its ability to secure the site, offering a defense against cyber criminality, such as SSL BEAST, CRIME and other attacks that target faulty SSL configurations.

The service integrates Qualys SSL Labs assessment technology, which audits SSL ecosystems, raises awareness and provides tools and documentation for website owners that allow them to improve their SSL implementations.

SSL Configuration Checker can be used by any organization by simply visiting sslcheck.globalsign.com, where users just have to enter the URL of the site they want to check. Following a quick test, the service will return a letter grade of the site’s configuration, along with a brief explanation of any issues it finds and some remediation steps they can follow to correct the issue(s).

The tool is already available in an array of languages, including Dutch, English, French, Japanese, German, Spanish and Russian.

GlobalSign Alert Service Helps Fight Phishing

Michael Garrity — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 22:00:00 GMT

In order to provide its customers with real-time alerts about their SSL Certificates, which tell them when their websites are compromised and used to support phishing attacks, certification authority GlobalSign has partnered with Internet services provider Netcraft.

The GlobalSign Netcraft Phishing Alert service will first tell GlobalSign when one of its customers’ websites is being used to support phishing attacks, and the company will then immediately notify and advise the customers on remediation steps so they can quickly fix the problem and stop the attack. And, if GlobalSign discovers that a site has specifically created for malicious intent, it will revoke its certificate.

This service, the first of its kind, means customers can maximize their investment in GlobalSign with additional security against these highly prevalent, not to mention persistent, criminal attacks. For a partner, Netcraft was an ideal selection, as it is continually produces an updated phishing feed (one that is currently used by all of the major Web browsers), and it has blocked more than 5 million phishing attacks to date.

Websites are required to have an SSL Certificate to activate the SSL/TLS technology built into a browser or server. Once it’s activated, it will provide an encrypted link between the browser and server to secure transactions or data submission. As SSL trust signals are meant to inspire confidence in users, it can be especially disastrous for consumers and website owners if a site is compromised and used to deploy phishing pages. Luckily for GlobalSign customers, the GlobalSign Netcraft Phishing Alert will significantly reduce their risk of becoming victims of such an attack.

OneClickSSL Plugin for DirectAdmin

Pete Prestipino — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 14:40:00 GMT

Security solution provider GlobalSign announced that its OneClickSSL plug-in is now available for DirectAdmin’s web hosting control panel.

The OneClickSSL plugin enables hosting companies to provide their clients with a user-friendly means to activate SSL (secure socket layers) from the control panel. The system automatically generates the cryptographic key, validates control of the website and then installs the issued certificate. No fuss, no muss. The plugin is already available for other popular Web hosting control panels including Plesk, Microsoft IIS, cPanel and ISPsystem.

“Integrating GlobalSign’s OneClickSSL technology allows our hosting customers to greatly simplify the whole SSL process, whilst fully delivering on our core strategy – to provide customers with a simplified user experience”, says Mark Kapowsky, Owner, DirectAdmin. “We are pleased to make this innovative technology accessible via our platform to help hosting companies meet the increasing demand for SSL security.”

GlobalSign Rolls Out MSSL v2

Michael Garrity — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 20:00:00 GMT

GlobalSign, the Certification Authority and specialist in SSL Certificate security, announced last week the launch of MSSL v2, the new version of their Managed SSL platform.

The company has found success in the certification field by offering publicly-trusted SSL Certificates, EV SSL, Managed SSL services and Code Signing for use on all platforms, including mobile. The first version of MSSL was GlobalSign's unique SaaS platform, and their upgrades have come as a response to both direct user feedback and the changing requirements of enterprise security.

The new version will provide user-friendly and highly-scalable methods for managing mulitple SSL Certificates for everything from the simplest to the most complex and distributed of organizations.

Among the new updates to MSSL are:

- Support for group companies/distributed entities: Now, a single umbrella entity can register all of its companies, branches and departments and have them easily centralized for management and billing purposes.

- Intuitive user interface: They've created a much simpler layout that is easy to use and lets the users quickly access functions and reports. Also, crucial information like pre-vetted domain pools and Certificates nearing expiration are clearly presented on the homepage. These changes are all based on direct user feedback.

- Expanded public ordering pages: With optional password protection and Pay-As-You-Go support, even heavily-distributed organizations can centralize Certificate applications by using these new pages, which allow anyone within the group to apply for a Certificate.

- Granular user rights: Permissions for users are now able to be assigned at the domain and company levels, allowing control over which staff members can apply for, approve, renew and revoke Certificates.

- Exportable audit logs: Any and all user activity will now be logged and exportable, which is a necessity when it comes to meeting increasingly rigorous compliance requirements.

As a service to customers and prospects, GlobalSign recently hosted a special webinar that included a virtual tour of the new features and functions of MSSL v2. To view the webinar, or just get more information on the Managed SSL platform's upgrades, simply click here.