WELCOME

This approach isn't always good, especially in a world where

Feb. 20, 2019 by Kimberly Parks

This approach isn't always good, especially in a world where browsers are becoming more and more ubiquitous. But the fact that we all use the same browsers and browsers support the same set of terms and phrases (some of them, sadly, still include their own names) makes it more difficult to see who is at fault for the problem.

Browsers are already taking a number of steps to try to tame URLs and make them less prone to malicious use. Chrome's use of "Not Secure" labels instead of showing the protocol name (http or https) replaces a piece of jargon with something that anyone can understand. Most browsers these days use color to highlight the actual domain name (printed in black type) from the rest of the URL (printed in grey type); Apple's Safari goes a step further, with its address bar suppressing the entire URL except for the domain name, revealing the full text only when the address box is clicked. Microsoft's Edge (and before it, Internet Explorer) dropped support for URLs with embedded usernames and passwords, because their legitimate uses were overwhelmed by malicious ones.

There's an interesting and very small but critical distinction to be made between HTTP (or other web technologies) and HTTPS. These technologies (along with the "always" and "no exceptions" rule) are used to protect the web from malicious intruders. These practices are often used to create and enforce standards that allow web developers to use third-party services without being detected by the browser. This is the problem that Mozilla's Firefox and Microsoft's Edge are struggling with, but it's something the company has had to face in the past.

In fact, the idea of doing away with HTTP was recently endorsed by Mozilla's chief executive, Steve Ballmer, who said in an interview with The Guardian that the company had been "very clear with the fact that we are not going to be doing HTTP all the time."

"There's an interesting and very small but critical distinction to be made between HTTP and HTTPS," he said, and it's that the web uses HTTPS, which is designed to block the Internet from being hijacked by malicious entities using some form of scripting. In terms of that issue, this has led some people to ask if HTTP is a better alternative to HTTPS, in the hope that there will be more people who will use it.

It doesn't, however, have to be that way. As it is with HTTP, it's not a bad idea to change the way that the Web behaves to ensure that the Web is