Secure Server

BiznizSource offers SSL for clients that need to transmit private or sensitive data collected in their web site securely.  

Where do I get secure certificate?
How do I use SSL?

What is SSL?
SSL is a security protocol that was developed by Netscape Communications Corporation, along with RSA** Data Security, Inc. This protocol ensures that data transferred between a client and a server remains private. It allows the client to authenticate the identity of the server.

Once your server has a digital certificate, SSL-enabled browsers like Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Explorer can communicate securely with your web site using SSL.

SSL uses a security handshake to initiate the TCP/IP connection between the client and the server. During the handshake, the client and server agree on the security keys that they will use for the session, and the client authenticates the server. After that, SSL is used to encrypt and decrypt all of the information in both the https request and the server response, including:

  • The URL the client is requesting
  • The contents of any form being submitted
  • Access authorization information like user names and passwords
  • All data sent between the client and the server.

HTTPS is a unique protocol that combines SSL and HTTP. You need to specify "https://" as an anchor in HTML documents that link to SSL-protected documents. A client user can also open a URL by specifying https:// to request an SSL-protected documents.

Because HTTPS (HTTP + SSL) and HTTP are different protocols and usually use different ports (443 and 80, respectively), you can run both secure and non-secure HTTP servers at the same time. As a result, you can choose to provide information to all users using no security, and specific information only to browsers who make secure requests. This is how a retail company on the Internet can allow users to look through the merchandise without security, but then fill out order forms and send their credit card numbers using security.

A browser that does not have support for HTTP over SSL will naturally not be able to request URLs using HTTPS. The non-SSL browsers will not allow submission of forms that need to be submitted securely.

Where Do I Get a Certificate
Option 1 (not available on NT)
Use BiznizSource's SSL digital certificate. This option gives you full SSL security on your web site. The only drawback is that you will need to use BiznizSource's domain name in any secure URL: https://www.BiznizSource.net/<your-userID>/<orderform.html>

Option 2
Contact us to obtain your own Digital Certificate by Thawte, a verisign company $125. https://www.yourdomain.com/orderform.html

How do I use SSL?
Attention: If you are using Miva Merchant, the following is built in to the software.  

If you have a link to an order form, for example, from your home page, you would need to use a URL similar to following:

  • https://www.BiznizSource.net/<your-userID>/orderform.html   -or-
  • https://www.yourdomain.com/orderform.html
    (if you have your own digital certificate)

The "s" in https:// suggests an SSL related file. Substitute the path to the order form starting with user directory name. If your account resides on server #2, you would need to use https://www.BiznizSource.net/<userid>/form.htm or 03, 04, etc. respectively depending on which server the secure form resides.

If the secure form calls a cgi script, you must also reference that script securely.

<form method="post" action="https://www.BiznizSource.net/<userid>/cgi-local/order.cgi">
-or-
<form method="post" action="https://www.yourdomain.com/cgi-local/order.cgi">
(if you have your own digital certificate)