What type of cryptography do SSL and TLS use?
“There are many types of cryptographic functions that are used in security protocols. The two most widely known cryptographic features are confidentiality (secrecy of data that would otherwise be transmitted in the clear), integrity (the ability to detect even minute changes in the data), and signature (the ability to trace the origin of the data). The combination of these features creates an important aspect of the overall security of a communications stream. SSL uses four significant types of features: confidentiality, integrity, signature, and key establishment (the way that a key is agreed to by the two parties). SSL uses cipher suites to define the set of cryptographic functions that a client and server use when communicating. This is unlike protocols such as IPsec and S/MIME where the two parties agree to individual cryptographic functions. That is, SSL exchanges say in effect, “Here is a set of functions to be used together, and here is another set I am willing to use.” IPsec an
