(No Ratings Yet)

Loading...

• Facebook
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• Mail

December 17, 2014 Comments closed

4 & 5 Year SSL Certificates Being Discontinued in 2015

in ssl certificates

On March 1st, 2015, The SSL Store™ will discontinue offering SSL certificates with validity periods of 4 and 5 years.

This is in accordance with new guidelines set forth by the Certificate Authority/Browser (CA/B) Forum, the governing body of the SSL industry. This update will affect all SSL certificates in the industry, including the entire product catalogs of Symantec, Comodo, Thawte, GeoTrust, and RapidSSL. (EV certificates are already limited to a maximum of two years so they are not affected by this change).

Please note that any active 4 or 5 year certificate that are reissued after the March 1st, 2015 deadline will automatically be truncated to the new maximum duration permissible, which is 39 months. Any active 4 or 5 year certificate that is reissued before this deadline will be unaffected. Therefore, The SSL Store™ strongly recommends that any new SSL purchase be for no more than a maximum of 3 years, in order to avoid any lost time and money due to a reissue.

To help further prepare for this change, we have amended all of our product pages to include a new yellow drop down box that appears anytime a 4 or 5 year certificate is selected for purchase. The new drop down box briefly explains this new update and emphasizes that all 4 or 5 year certificates reissued after the March 1st deadline will be truncated to the new maximum industry standard of 39 months.

Ultimately, this is good news for the SSL industry, as certificates with shorter lifespans make security updates much easier and more streamlined. So, recent updates like the SHA-2 upgrade, internal domain issuance, and more industry-wide enhancements that have become quite commonplace with SSL will be much less of a hassle.

Also, certificates with shorter lifespans will offer more in the way of security, as companies will have to reaffirm their identities in a more timely fashion. It goes without saying that trust and security are of paramount importance to the SSL market, so any effort to enhance either of these components is good for the overall health of the market.

We would advise all of our partners to begin informing their customers of this impending industry change. If you have any questions about deprecation of 4 and 5 year SSL certificates, please feel free to contact our Customer Experience department via support@theSSLstore.com, Live Chat on our website, or directly at +1 727-388-4240.