Google, Microsoft and Mozilla have decided to stop trusting SHA-1 through their respective web browsers. The algorithm was developed by the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to be used digitally signing signatures. In effect, it acts as a fingerprint making it easy to tell if a document has been modified. Oscar Arean, technical operations manager of disaster recovery provider Databarracks, advises businesses to act now in order to protect customer data. He says a failure to upgrade to the SHA-256 model could mean the end for sites using the now insecure hashing algorithm.”]