Message Server Integration Guide › Voltage SecureMail Integration › Set Up SecureMail Integration › Establish an SSL Connection to the SecureMail Web Service › What is SSL?

What is SSL?

The Secure Sockets Layer protocol (SSL) helps ensure that a network transaction (such as a web request) is only serviced by the intended network host (such as a web site). SSL also prevents transmitted data from being intercepted by a third party. The connection does this by encrypting the traffic using public/private key encryption.

• You obtain a public key via a certificate which is validated against a trusted certificate authority.
• Each client holds a well-known public certificate of an organization that it trusts (the certificate authority). The client then requests the certificate of the server that it needs to connect to. If the server's certificate is correctly signed by a trusted certificate authority, the client proceeds with the connection and negotiates the encrypted communications channel.

Typical SSL applications include online purchasing and webmail, and an increasing number of web sites and applications (such as instant messaging). In particular, the widespread use of social networking sites is a major cause for concern regarding data loss. Your ability to analyze data transmitted from your company network to these external networks is increasingly important.