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We're
sensitive to your concern about sharing your personal information
on the Web. Rest assured that your transmissions to credit card and
loan providers is safe. When you apply for a credit card or loan your
information is encrypted with state of the art software.
Please understand that UK Credit Card Applications does not collect
or transmit any of your details. We don't provide credit cards or
loans; we link you with the card providers and lenders who do.
When you select a credit card offer or link on this site, you are
sent directly to the credit card or loan provider. The provider will
then collect your information via a secure server (we would not link
to them otherwise). Please read the Security and Privacy Policies
of the credit card merchant you select to learn what they do with
your information and how they handle it. This information can be found
via a hypertext link on their perspective homepage.
In any
event, UK Credit Card Applications will never sell your email address
or use it to solicit you for anything should you decide to email us.
SSL Encryption and Your Privacy
We see
the term "SSL Encryption" all over the internet these days.
Yet unless you know what it is, or how it works, it is a pretty meaningless
term.
The Details:
SSL (Secure Socket Layer) was invented by Netscape Communications
Corporation. An encryption scheme used to encrypt transactions in
higher-level protocols such as HTTP, NNTP and FTP. SSL is a system
for servers to run authentication by verifying the identity to the
client, the encryption of data that is in transit, and client authentication
itself . SSL is currently used commercially on different internet
browsers, like Netscape Navigator, Secure Mosaic, and Microsoft Internet
Explorer, and many various servers, including Netscape, Microsoft,
IBM, Quarterdeck and OpenMarket.
SSL is a type of "secret code" to exchange information between
the client (you) and a server. This "secret code" is known
as the session key and is used to encrypt the exchange of information
(both sending and receiving). Each exchange of information uses a
different key so that if someone painstakingly manages to decipher
an exchange, it does not mean that they've found the server's key.
To decipher the entire exchange between you and the server, the culprit
would have to decode each individual exchange of information.
Netscape servers and browsers use either a 40-bit encryption or a
128-bit. A 40-bit key is only slightly insecure because it's vulnerable
to what is known as a "brute force attack". In 1995 a French
computer guru used a large network of individual computers to crack
open a 40-bit encrypted message in just a little over one week. Some
feel that various government agencies and "super nerds"
(with equipment they built themselves) can crack a 40-bit message
in less than an hour.. Using a 128-bit key is a different story. To
break the code on a single 128 bit exchange using "brute force"
would at the least, take millions of years.
In Microsoft
Internet Explorer, an closed lock will appear on the bottom right
of the browser when encryption is in effect. To check if 40-bit or
128-bit encryption is in use just open the document information page
by hitting FILE then PROPERTIES located at the upper left of the browser.
In Netscape 3.X and earlier, to tell the type of encryption in use,
just look at the "document" information" screen from
the file menu. The little key you see in the lower left corner of
the Netscape browser also gives this information. A solid key with
three teeth is 128-bit, a solid key with two teeth is 40-bit. A broken
key means no encryption. Remember if your browser can support 128-bit
encryption, it may use 40-bit encryption when dealing with older servers
or to servers outside the U.S. and Canada. With Netscape 4.X and higher,
click on the "Security" button on the bar to see if the
current page is encrypted and to what extent.
Thank you for using our site!
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