Tag: ssl

https does not work for my domain

Question:

I tried to go to https://my-domain.com/ (notice the ‘s’ in https) to view a secure, SSL-encrypted version of my page. My page did not come up. How do I enable SSL?

Answer:

SSL requires a dedicated IP. By default https will go to the generic server page (the control panel).

A dedicated IP is $2 per month and would allow https to work on one domain. Each domain needs its own IP (this is how SSL works and is not a rule of ours).

SSL also requires an SSL certificate. We can create an un-signed cert for you for free. An un-signed cert will encrypt your pages but show a warning in most browsers the first time you load the page because the cert is unsigned.

For a yearly fee we can provide you with an official signed cert which does not show any warning message. Contact support to buy a certificate.

You may have used this:

https://your-server-here.phpwebhosting.com/~your-user-name-here/

in the past for SSL. This still works but is not guaranteed to always work in the future. There are several issues with providing ~username dirs that have caused some discussion about discontinuing them in the future.

How can we make our site secure?

Using SSL involves purchasing an SSL Certificate and installing it to your account.

A certificate is $59 per year and will match both www.yourdomain.com and yourdomain.com – many SSL providers only allow one name. Ours will cover both.

There is also a $2 monthly charge for a dedicated IP address. A dedicated IP is required for SSL to work (with any hosting company). Most Search Engine Optimization (SEO) experts also believe that a dedicated IP can improve your search engine rankings.

The first step in getting an SSL certificate is answering the following questions (required to create the cert) :

Country Name (two letter code – example: US)
State or Province Name (full name)
Locality Name (eg – city)
Organization Name (eg – company name)
Organizational Unit Name (eg – section or department – this is optional)
Secure URL (eg – secure.yourdomain.com, www.yourdomain.com, etc.)
Email Address
An optional company name (this is optional)

Note: The secure URL is the URL that the cert will work for. If you use www.yourdomain.com, we will add yourdomain.com for free.

Enter this information into a support ticket along with a statement such as “I approve the $59 yearly cert fee and $2 monthly dedicated IP fee” and we can have your cert ready in a few hours in most cases.