Announcement: 3-Year SSL Certificates to be Terminated from March 1, 2018

Maximum lifespan of SSL certificates to shortened to 2 years

Beginning March 1, 2018, you will no longer be able to buy 3-year SSL certificates. This change, passed by the CA/Browser forum last year, is set to become a reality in the upcoming days. As a consequence, all the certificates will come with the maximum lifecycle of 2 years. This 2-year period will also include an additional period for website admins to renew their certs, taking the total lifespan to 825 days.

Note that this change of rule is going to affect all certificate issuing authorities, not just Comodo.

Many of you might be aware that Extended Validation (EV) SSL certs already observe this 2-year limitation. From now on, this is going to be extended to the DV and OV SSL certificates.

Don’t like this change? Well, it’s for your own good

Almost no website admin would like this change, right. After all, who likes to go through the same issuance, verification, and installation processes again and again? We understand their pain. However, it’ll ultimately benefit everyone – including the website owners.

SSL certificates are the backbone of today’s website security. It’s the first thing any security specialist recommends when it comes to enhancing website security. That’s why keeping the algorithms and ciphers behind the SSL certificates up-to-date is of the utmost importance. Outdated or broken technology is an invitation to trouble. Shortening the validity period eliminates usage of deprecated technologies.

Another reason why CA/B forum has made this decision is to make sure that the organizations/enterprises that are in hold of websites are still active. Think of it as renewing your driving license to prove that your driving skills are still intact.

Get used to shorter certificate lifespan

There was a time when an SSL certificate was valid for as long as two years. That time is long gone. Then the maximum lifespan got reduced to five years, then three, and now two. It seems unlikely that we’ll go below this two-year validity. But as they say, ‘never say never.’ It could possibly go down to one year.

Things to keep in mind

Given this change, we at the Comodo SSL Store are going to eliminate the 3-year option from all the certificates starting February 20, 2018. Now you might think of purchasing a 3-year cert before the deadline arrives. And you certainly can. However, if you ever have to re-issue it will revert to a two-year certificate and you will lose money. Nobody wants to risk that, so our advice to you is just pay for two years.