Really Simple SSL – REVIEW

As a website owner, one of the important factors you want to implement is to have your website secure from attacks such as cybercrime and identity theft. The first step to achieve this is to start by installing an SSL certificate for your website. This SSL certificate protects your users as they visit your website to obtain information, create accounts, or make purchases.

This article reviews one of the most used and popular SSL Certificate provider for WordPress websites called Really Simple SSL. It is a simple to install WordPress plugin that comes with additional protection features that ensure full protection of your website.

You can easily identify that your website is installed with an SSL Certificate by confirming that your URL has changed from HTTP to HTTPS.

Let us look at what Really Simple SSL offers.

Really Simple SSL does not come with any complexities while setting up. You simply download the plugin, install and then activate it. After activation, your website will get updated to start using HTTPS under the free SSL Certificate provided by Really Simple SSL.

Really Simple SSL certificate automatically configures your website to use SSL once installed.

It does not require you to use a technical professional to set up the SSL. This simply means that you can install the plugin by yourself without being offered any assistance and all HTTP URLs in your website will be automatically upgraded to HTTPS URLs.

Security Headers add an extra security layer to your website to protect it from attacks such as malwares, cross-site scripting or clickjacking.

Really Simple SSL provides a variety of security headers that you can add to your website. These are X-XSS Protection, X-Content-Type-Options, and X-Frame-Options.

Really Simple SSL can protect cookies by adding specific attributes to them, preventing outsiders from manipulating the set cookies. Cookies are small files of information sent to a browser (being used by a visitor) from your website or your web server. Really Simple SSL makes cookies more secure by incorporating parameters that can:

• Make the browser to only allow the server to access certain types of cookies.
• Ensure that the set cookies are sent over a secure SSL connection.
• Make your website use only cookies to store session data.

Really Simple SSL performs Vulnerability Measures by continually monitoring the version of WordPress core, WordPress themes, and plugins for security vulnerabilities. You also receive notifications if a vulnerability issue is identified. This will help you take the necessary steps to make your visitors secure. With its monitoring capabilities, you can configure Really Simple SSL to automatically:

• Force software updates to the latest versions
• Quarantine vulnerable plugins and Themes

Thus, you are able to focus on other important issues concerning your website while Really Simple SSL takes care of security vulnerabilities.

Really Simple SSL comes with an in-built server health that scans your server and check whether there are any issues with your site SSL certificate functionality. The manner in which your server is configured might make it vulnerable to attackers. Really Simple SSL will help you identify this vulnerability so that you can take corrective measures.

Hardening features protect your website by reducing the attacking gaps and vulnerabilities that can be exploited by attackers. It involves techniques such as ensuring secure configuration of software like WordPress and the web server.

This feature by Really Simple SSL makes your website more secure by making it difficult for attackers to compromise your site.

After installing the SSL certificate, some resources of your website might contain links to images, JavaScripts, and CSS files from third parties. If you load your website over HTTPS but your resources redirect and load over HTTP, this creates a Mixed Content.

Mixed Content makes your site get flagged as not secure despite having an SSL certificate installed. You can identify this if you don’t see the secure lock before your website URL.

You can easily fix this using the Mixed Content Scan feature offered by Really Simple SSL Pro. It will scan your whole website or blog, and display the issues that you need to fix with the press of a button. If Really Simple SSL can’t fix the problem because of complexity, it will give you instructions on how to fix it.

The team behind Really Simple SSL continually keeps updating the SSL certificate to protect your website against the dangers of cybercrime and identity theft.

You can simply enjoy this feature much better by enabling the plugin to automatically update in WordPress each time an update is released.

Really Simple SSL provides 24/7 support as well as supportive documentation regarding the plugin.

If you get yourself in tough budget constraints, Really Simple SSL provides a free SSL Certificate with limited features. However, upgrading to Really Simple SSL Pro allows you to fully utilize your website security with the features discussed above.

Agency

• Price – $199 per year
• Use Really Simple SSL up to 25 Websites

Professional

• Price – $99 per year
• Use Really Simple SSL up to 5 Websites

Personal

• Price – $49 per year
• Use Really Simple SSL for one Website

1. Log into your WordPress account.

2. In your WordPress dashboard, navigate to “Plugins” via the menu on the left and click on “Add New Plugin”

3. In the top right search bar type “Really Simple SSL” and press enter. You will then see “Really Simple SSL”

4. Click on “Install Now” to download and install the plugin to your website.

5. After installation is completed, click on “Activate”

6. Really Simple SSL will get activated and take you to the dashboard. Complete the tasks identified to improve your security progress. The higher the percentage the more security you add to your website.

7. To revisit the dashboard, navigate to “Settings” in your WordPress dashboard via the menu on the left and click on “SSL & Security”

Congratulations! You have successfully installed Really Simple SSL on your WordPress website and are ready to explore more SSL security features.