SSL is an industry standard for sending wire- or socket-level encrypted data over secure network connections.
Before the SSL connection is established, the server and the client exchange a series of I/O round trips to negotiate and agree upon a secure encrypted session. This is called the SSL handshake.
When a client requests a connection, the SSL-enabled server presents its certificate to prove its identity before data is transmitted. Essentially, the handshake consists of the following steps:
The client sends a connection request to the server. The request includes the SSL (or Transport Layer Security, TLS) options that the client supports.
The server returns its certificate and a list of supported cipher suites, which includes SSL/TLS support options, algorithms used for key exchange, and digital signatures.
A secure, encrypted session is established when both client and server have agreed upon a CipherSuite.
For more specific information about the SSL handshake and the SSL/TLS protocol, see the Internet Engineering Task Force Web site.
For a list of cipher suites that Adaptive Server supports, see “Cipher Suites”.
