All payments processed through this site are handled over Secure Socket Layer (SSL). You will enter our secure area when you commence the payment part of your order.

This means your credit number will be electronically encrypted for your protection and privacy as it travels from your computer to our order center.

How can I tell when a web site is secure?
If you are using Firefox, Netscape, or Internet Exporer 3.0 or higher, check for the picture of a lock in the lower right hand corner of your browser's application window. If the lock is closed you are in a secure area. In some older browsers you may see a key instead of a padlock. Another way to tell is by looking at the URL in your "location" bar: you will see "https://" at the beginning of the URL when you are in the shopping cart area. You must be logged in and past the first page before the SSL encryption will begin.

What is SSL security?
SSL is a protocol to provide secure communications on the Internet. SSL does three things:

1. SSL authenticates that the server you've connected to is the one it purports to be.
2. SSL creates a secure communication channel by encrypting all communication between the user and the server.
3. SSL conducts a cryptographic word count to ensure data integrity between the server and the user.

How an SSL certificate secures an online transaction:
When accessing an SSL-secured Web site, the user's browser sends a message to the Web server, requesting a secure session.

• The Web server responds by sending the user its server certificate (which includes its public key).
• The user's browser will verify that the server's certificate is valid and has been signed by a CA whose certificate is in the browser's database. It will also verify that the CA certificate has not expired.
• If the certificates are all valid, the user's browser will generate a one-time session key and encrypt it with the server's public key. The user's browser will then send the encrypted session key to the server so that they will both have a copy.
• The server will decrypt the message using its private key and recover the session key.

This completes the SSL handshake process, and a secure SSL connection has been established. The entire process of establishing the SSL connection happens transparently to the user and takes only seconds.