Serving Your Customers 159
15 Select the SSL certificate that you wish to install from the Certificate
drop-down box.
If there is no Certificate drop-down box on the screen, this means that you are on a
shared hosting account; therefore, you need to upgrade your hosting package and
purchase a dedicated IP address from your provider.
16 Select the SSL support check box and click OK.
Creating and Installing Free Self-signed SSL Certificate
If you do not want to purchase SSL certificates, but still need to secure a site, you can
create a self-signed certificate and install it on your web server. This will provide data
encryption; however, your customers‘ browsers will show warning messages telling that
your certificate is not issued by a recognized authority. Thus, using self-signed
certificates is not recommended as it will not instill confidence in customers, and is
likely to adversely affect the online sales of your client.
To secure a site with a self-signed SSL certificate:
1 Go to Domains > domain name > Certificates and click Add New Certificate.
2 Specify the certificate properties:
Certificate name. This will help you identify this certificate in the repository.
Encryption level. Choose the encryption level of your SSL certificate. We
recommend that you choose a value more than 1024 bit.
Specify your location and organization name. The values you enter should not
exceed the length of 64 symbols.
Specify the domain name for which you wish to generate an SSL certificate. For
example: www.your-domain.com.
Enter the domain owner's e-mail address.
3 Click Self-Signed. Your certificate will be generated and stored in the
repository.
4 Return to the domain's administration screen (Domain > domain name)
and click Setup in the Hosting group.
5 Select the self-signed SSL certificate from the Certificate drop-down
box.
If there is no Certificate drop-down box on the screen, this means that you are on a
shared hosting account; therefore, you need to upgrade your hosting package and
purchase a dedicated IP address from your hosting provider.
6 Select the SSL support check box and click OK.
