Starting in July, Google Chrome will soon flag every site that doesn’t use HTTP encryption. With the launch of Chrome 68, Chrome will mark all sites as ‘not secure’ and also highlight its URL bar. Chrome began to prominently label certain insecure HTTP sites as ‘not secure’ in early 2017 in the address bar. Now, it announced its forthcoming plan to mark all HTTP pages with the same on the upcoming version of the browser.
Over the course of the last few years, Google kept its sight of the use of HTTP to help keep the browsing data safe from anyone who could spy on the web traffic. Chrome 56 marked HTTP pages that collect credit cards, passwords, and other vital information with a ‘not secure label. On the left of Chrome’s omnibar, it was to convey to users that their connection to a particular site might not be private.
With Chrome 62 Google has started marking all HTTP sites as insecure with data entry fields. Google continues its efforts with Chrome 68 as well while marking all HTTP sites as ‘not secure. However, the gray icon is to remain for the time being. With its new version, every HTTP site will be flagged as ‘not secure’ whether there is an input data field or not.
The company states that 68% of all traffic on Android and Windows is now protected, while it is 78% on Chrome OS and Mac. The company also states that of the top 100 sites on the web, 81 of them uses HTTP by default. With its automated Lighthouse developer tool and other set-up guides, the company continues to encourage sites to use HTTPS to transition over.
