In response to the question of whether linking to unsecured HTTP web pages has any negative effects on SEO, Google’s Search Advocate John Muller offered an intriguing response.
It makes sense that a page’s ability to connect to HTTP sites would be seen negatively by users as a bad user experience.
Differentiating HTTP from HTTPS
To deliver data from a server to a browser, HTTP is a protocol (a set of rules).
With HTTPS, users can be sure that the website they’re viewing is safe and can be trusted with private data like passwords.
A ranking signal is HTTPS.
Google is recognized for using the safe HTTPS protocol as a ranking factor.
Google declared HTTPS to be a ranking indication in 2014.
The notification said:
“In addition to our own efforts, we’re also trying to make the Internet a safer place overall. Making ensuring that website users access via Google is safe is a significant component of it.
For these reasons, we’ve been conducting studies for the past several months that consider the use of secure, encrypted connections by websites as a signal in our search ranking algorithms.
We’re beginning to employ HTTPS as a ranking indication since we’ve observed favorable outcomes.
While we offer webmasters time to transition to HTTPS, it is currently merely a very lightweight signal, affecting less than 1% of worldwide requests and carrying less weight than other signals like high-quality content.
However, as we want to encourage all website owners to move from HTTP to HTTPS to keep everyone secure online, we may decide to toughen it over time.
The context for the query concerning connecting out to insecure HTTP pages is that HTTPS is a ranking indication.
Is Linking to HTTP Pages Bad?
However, the issue was restricted to determining if connecting to insecure websites that exclusively utilize HTTP hurt SEO service India.
The query posed was as follows:
Does the fact that my page has links to external, unsafe websites hurt my SEO ranking?
Therefore, HTTP is not HTTPS.
Muller clarified that there is no such thing as an SEO score before rephrasing the question to reflect what he thought it was asking.
Muller responded:
First of all, we have no concept of an SEO score.
Therefore, you really don’t need to worry about anything like an SEO score.
However, I can kind of understand the query, which is, “Is it terrible if I link to an HTTP website rather than an HTTPS page?”
And in our opinion, everything is wonderful.
You would link to it if these pages were on HTTP.
Users could reasonably anticipate discovering that.
There is nothing wrong with connecting to those kinds of websites.
Since HTTP pages tend to be more dated, crusty, and uncool than HTTPS pages, there is no negative impact on your website if you avoid connecting to them.
I wouldn’t stress over that.
OK to Link to HTTP Pages?
Muller stated that utilizing the HTTP protocol to connect to another website is acceptable (for SEO purposes).
HTTP, however, does not provide a way for the browser to confirm that the server returning a response to a request for a web page is the right server.
Because they believed it was only important for companies dealing with sensitive customer data, including banks, hospitals, shopping sites, and other industries, many online publishers delayed using the HTTPS protocol in the past.
However, this is no longer the case since websites that utilize the HTTP protocol are vulnerable to assault, which might have unforeseen effects on such websites that could harm their bottom line.
Hackers have created methods over time to deceive site users into thinking they are viewing a certain website. Once deceived, the hacker will collect critical information such as bank passwords.
Some of the exploits that can occur when someone accesses a site utilizing an insecure HTTP implementation include DNS hijacking, man-in-the-middle attacks, and domain spoofing.
So, identifying outbound HTTP links and determining if the associated site uses HTTPS may be a great practice (for reasons related to user experience). If not, it could be useful to look for a better website to link to if visitor security and usability are essential to you.
Beyond the effect on SEO companies in India, there are other factors to take into account.
