I’m curious what the benefits are of paying for SSL certificates vs using a free provider such as letsencrypt.

What exactly are you trusting a cert provider with and what are the security implications? What attack vectors do you open yourself up to when trusting a certificate authority with your websites’ certificates?

In what way could it benefit security and/or privacy to utilize a paid service?

And finally, which paid SSL providers are considered trustworthy?

I know Digicert is a big player, but their prices are insane. Comodo seems like a good affordable option, but is it a trustworthy company?

  • LaserEnglish
    1·
    3 months ago

    I was also with a provider that didn’t offer API access for the longest time. When they then increased prices, I switched, now paying a third of their asking price per year at a very good provider.

    I guess migrating is difficult if the provider doesn’t offer a mechanism to either dump the DNS to a file or perform a zone transfer (the later being part of the standard).

    Can only recommend INWX for domains, though my personal requirements aren’t the highest.