Without question, the use of web-based encryption SSL/TLS has increased significantly in the past years. Industry studies claim that more than 40% of websites are encrypted today – up from 20% just a year ago – and that encrypted enterprise traffic has reached 50% – up from 25% – 35% in 2013.

However, while encryption keeps data confidential, it does not protect us from threats that are embedded in the data itself. In fact, it conceals these threats and adds network performance burdens for organizations that wish to inspect the traffic. Many organizations do not have in place the architectures or security controls that can meet decryption requirements, and global differences regarding regulation of the use of encryption further complicates matters.

The first in a series on encryption, this paper looks at where we are today regarding industry adoption of encryption, and what is driving the increase in encrypted web traffic and websites.