Cybersecurity legend John McAfee has today launched BlackCert, Inc., a division of his FutureTense Central company offering digital Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificates that utilize the highest level of encryption technology in the industry along with highly competitive pricing.

The SSL certificates operate in accordance with the Certificate Authority Security Council, the Certificate Authority/Browser Forum, and the Online Trust Alliance, and along with being trusted by 99.9 percent of all web browsers and email clients in the world today, will also come with a around-the-clock support and the assurance of warrantied protection on behalf of the enterprise and consumer.

“BlackCert is an important part of our vision at FutureTense Central,” McAfee told SiliconANGLE. “We live in an age of constant security threats…without compromise, by delivering the top digital certificates in the business, BlackCert is going to make a difference in the world of web security, financial transactions, privacy and identity.”

As we broke exclusively last week, BlackCert comes to market with unlimited server licensing for each certificate, eliminating the need to pay for certificates per server as is currently charged by the big players in the space, subsequently saving money for enterprise users while making administration easier and saving management time; by offering certificates on an unlimited use basis, BlackCert customers are able to use each certificate on as many servers they desired to support an application at no additional cost.

Non domain-based licensing

One angle the new company is pushing is the benefits SSL certificates offer in terms of search engine optimization (SEO) post an announcement from Google that SSL-enabled sites will rank more highly in results.

” Industry research has revealed that the notion persists that acquiring and managing SSL Certificates is expensive and time consuming,” the company said. “Leading companies contributed to this through their per server licensing models which required an extensive validation process for each server and a separate license for each installation.”

BlackCert, as part of its unlimited server licensing model, has also done away with domain-based licensing, allowing enterprise users the ability to provide unlimited installations on as many systems as needed, unlimited issuance, revocation and renewal available at any time; the short version is BlackCert’s Wildcard Certificates will secure multiple domains with just one certificate, lowering costs and reducing certificate management tasks.

Let’s Encrypt

Spokesman John Casaretto explained in an interview that while BlackCert supports Let’s Encrypt, the free, automated, and open certificate authority from the Internet Security Research Group, the problem with the offering is that it is worthless when it comes to identity.  

“All it says is that the traffic aspect is encrypted,” Casaretto explained. “With third-party certificate authority, there’s a validation.”

“What if everyone had licenses they printed at home?  That’s great you have a license, but all it means is you have a really nice printer. We trust domain-validated, high assurance, and extended validation certificates because the issuing authorities check information about the business that applies to them. The same way we trust a real state driver’s license as a valid form of identification – you’ve proven who you are to an agency that holds applicants to these standards.”

“Let’s Encrypt is an effort to raise the overall security of web traffic by giving away certificates so as much web traffic as possible is encrypted.  That’s great, but it falls short on identity,” Casaretto went on. “We support it, but our mission is to go farther.”

Coding Signal Certificates

BlackCert is working on introducing Code Signing certificates, Client Certificate S/MIME, and a comprehensive portal for total enterprise certificate management that they claim will be second to none in the industry.

“Secured and private web transactions are a fundamental element of a complete, secure data center and BlackCert is approaching the market at a grass-roots level, with total responsiveness in product evolution,” McAfee added. “Our customers and the market will help us drive new web security products on our journey, we are already on our way.”

BlackCert is open for business as of today with validated certificates available for as low as $29 per year, with promotional discounts being advertised on various @BlackCert social media channels. All products are being offered with 24/7 customer support channels, available by chat, phone, and email, and customers are also being offered a no questions asked 30 day money back guarantee.

Image credit: BlackCert/ provided