SSL certificates

Hi,
An ssl certificate provides the public key for data encryption. it's validity is ensured by being compared to a 'root' certificate. Root certs are generated by the authority that you bought the cert from (IE a verisign cert will be compared to a verisign root cert). the root certs are loaded on automatically via IE. If the ssl cert has expired, then when the clients browser loads it and compares it to the root, a warning will display that the cert is no longer valid BUT - the user is still given the option to use the ssl cert if they wish - if they say no then the connection will terminate. In short, the ssl cert will still encrypt the connection - but only if the user accepts the risk. Hope this helps...