Wondering why your address bar (the URL bar – where you type the web address you want to visit) has turned green? Why you’re looking at a pop-up that says “Website Identification – VeriSign has identified this site as:” and “Should I trust this site?”? A new anti-phishing feature in Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) has been rolled out and announced this week. Websites that qualify and have demonstrated that they are legitimate sites can be certified under the program which will cause your address bar in IE7 to turn green. The green address bar is meant to indicate that the site is safe – or, at least, not a phishing site.
The certificate is, naturally, issued by Verisign.
So far the only sites known to have been certified, and to trigger the wearing of the green address bar, are Overstock.com, and Verisign itself, however Verisign is said to have hundreds of customers who have already signed up for the certification process.
While neither Microsoft nor Verisign has yet indicated that the green bar is only visible in Vista, an informal survey by the Internet Patrol indicates that the green bar does not appear for those running Internet Explorer 7 in XP, but it does for those running IE7 in Vista.
Here’s how it looks:
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Photo courtesy of Jake Ludington
Photo courtesy of Jake Ludington
The Internet Patrol is completely free, and reader-supported. Your tips via CashApp, Venmo, or Paypal are appreciated! Receipts will come from ISIPP.
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It does show green using XP on IE7, but only when you go to a secure site ie: https://