Support for Extended Validation (EV) SSL Certificates has been enabled in Internet Explorer 7, revealed Microsoft at the RSA Conference 2007. In this context, IE7 becomes the first browser to deliver support for Extended Validation SSL Certificates. Microsoft applauded the initiative as an investment in customer protection.

Since last year, the Redmond Company promised that the EV SSL Certificates will be supported in Internet Explorer 7 as of January 2007. The EV SSL Certificates are the next step of Secure Socket Layer Certificates, delivering not only encryption, but also a standard for identity.

"Back in November, we announced our intention to bring Extended Validation SSL Certificates to IE7. This week at RSA we've announced that IE7's EV SSL support is now live! Many Certification Authorities (CAs), including VeriSign, CyberTrust, Entrust and GoDaddy, are already issuing EV SSL Certificates. We are already seeing businesses such as eBay, PayPal, Charles Schwab, Overstock.com , French Soaps and Stardock) beginning to use EV to offer verified identity information to their users," said Jeremy Dallman, IE Program Manager.

Towards the end of November 2006, Gartner published a study according to which in the past year, e-commerce sales have suffered losses of $2 billion because of security concerns. Microsoft has presented the concert between IE7 and EV SSL as a method to reduce that amount.

In the end, support for Extended Validation (EV) SSL Certificates in Internet Explorer 7 is a result of Microsoft's collaboration with the top certification authorities to deliver a verification mechanism that would attest the identity of a website's owner.