Let’s Encrypt’s free security certificates have been used 1 million times

Let’s Encrypt’s SSL certificate service launch marked a milestone for the open Web last year when it became the first major service to offer valid certificates for free.

Now, just a few months past general availability, the group has passed more than 1 million issued certificates in use across the Web.

That’s a huge achievement, given that the certificate authority is still in beta. It also passed the 500,000 mark just one month ago, marking a huge acceleration in adoption.

Larger companies have started integrating its service into their products, like Dreamhost’s Web hosting and Synology’s storage hardware, which has accelerated adoption significantly.

Now that it’s easier than ever to get a security certificate for any website there are few excuses to not use one – even blogs should leverage HTTPS, because it prevents people from monitoring visitors’ browsing habits and any information they share.

Given that both Chrome and Firefox are testing changes that will mark sites that contain forms and no HTTPS as insecure, now’s the time to consider making the switch before that happens.