What is SSL ?
SSL refers to Secure Sockets Layer. SSL is a protocol for
secure communication over a network.
SSL provides security to applications running over a
connection oriented protocol service
(a connection oriented transport
protocol is preferred). It involves exchange of digital certificates
issued by
Certification Authorities like Verisign which are
then verified by the client and/or server sides.
Once this authentication is done, the client and the server
exchange a master session key and exchange
encrypted data using symmetric
key encryption based on this master session key.
All packets sent from the client application to the server
are encrypted with the session key to provide
security against
potential evesdroppers.
SSL is a security protocol being used by most of the reliable
e-commerce websites on the Internet
to safeguard the
integrity of information exchanged with clients.