Http vs Https

When using the Internet, specialy when using your credit card, or submitting some kind of sensitive information (Social Security, Personal Information, Credit Card, etc) always check to have a secure connection.

How do I check for a secure connection?

By looking at the address bar, if there is a https://website.com, or making sure there is a padlock on the browser window.

This is what the padlock looks like:

 Internet Explorer’s padlock

  Google Chrome’s padlock

A clear example of a local Credit Union (Bank) secure website seen from Internet Explorer:

SSL Secured Gesa.com

Non SSL Secured Yahoo.com

Another example:

SSL Secured Gesa.com seen from Google Chrome browser

Non SSL Secured Yahoo.com from Google Chrome browser.

In this two examples, the https: before the actual address, and the padlock indicate that there is a secure connection between the user and the web servers in this case my local credit union Gesa.com

On the Internet Explorer sample, it even shows who issued the certificate, (Identified by GeoTrust)

By checking your web browser and the information that is given in the address bar, we can determine if the website is who it claims to be.