Note that an updated version of this test methodology (v1.51) has published on our website.

Use of the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol and its current iteration, Transport Layer Security (TLS), is rising dramatically in response to an ever-increasing need for online privacy. In August 2019, NSS Labs found that 58% of web traffic is being sent over HTTPS. SSL/TLS is prone to various security attacks that can occur at multiple levels of communication in the network—attacks have been observed on the handshake protocol, record protocol, application data protocol, and PKI, to name just a few. To address the growing threat of focused attacks using the most common web protocols and applications, NSS has developed a methodology that tests the capabilities and performance of devices providing visibility into the SSL/TLS protocols.