About SSL certification
If your site stores sensitive data, such as customer profiles, we recommend that you secure your site. To secure a site, you need a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate.
SSL is a protocol that transmits private documents through the Internet. It creates a secure connection between a client and a server over which any amount of data can be sent securely. SSL works by using a private key to encrypt data transferred over the SSL connection.
SSL certificates are available from a Certificate Authority (CA), such as VeriSign®.
Securing your site is a four-step process.
Step 1: Generating an SSL certificate request
Step 2: Sending the request to a Certificate Authority (CA)
Step 3: Loading the SSL certificate onto your domain
Step 4: Restarting the Web server