These days almost all the websites are using secure connection protocol called HTTPS. When you open these websites in your web browser, you notice a lock icon in the address bar of the browser and that their web address starts with https://.
HTTPS protocol and SSL certificates have existed since the 90s, but back then they were used only by the sites where the user had to enter some sensitive information like the sites with option for paying with credit card. Because of the campaign started by the giants like Google and Mozilla, now are websites are offering HTTPS connections. With the help of technologies offered by Cloudflare, it has become really easy to make any website secure and HTTPS compliant.
And now Mozilla Firefox has a new option that simply blocks all the non-HTTPS connections. This new feature is available starting from Firefox version 83 and is called “HTTPS-Only Mode”. Here is how you can enable it:
- Launch Firefox, click on the menu icon (three lines), and select Options.
- On the options screen, select Privacy & Security section from the left.
- Scroll down to the very bottom of the screen to find HTTPS-Only Mode.
- Choose Enable HTTPS-Only Mode in all windows. from the list of options to enable HTTPS-only mode for all the windows.
Now Firefox will browse all the websites only and only through the HTTPS protocol. In the event you encounter a website that has only HTTP protocol connection available, Firefox will stop and give you a warning – “Secure Connection Not Available”.
You will have two options at this point – either access that website by temporarily turning off the HTTPS-Only Mode for that particular site, or go back one step in the browser history and avoid accessing that website. Firefox also suggests that when accessing HTTP sites, a middle-man attacker could be involved and you should avoiding entering any sensitive information.