When you send information from a browser or server, the transmission is in the form of plain text. This is very dangerous because anyone seeking to hack your site will be able to intercept these documents and interpret the details. This could allow malware to easily penetrate your website, which without the proper countermeasures might lead to site crashes.

SSL is a security protocol that encrypts data and adds an extra layer of security to your website. Therefore, data and links in-transit don’t go without verification. There are various transactions and confidential details that pass over the Internet on a daily basis. These details are quite sensitive, and protection is paramount against online threats, which is why one should invest in SSL. Sites with this security feature will have a green address bar with an SSL-secured site as an extension; alternatively, a lock icon might just represent it. Sites with SSL also begin with ‘https’ rather than the traditional ‘http’.