Rather than passing through SSL sessions between clients and servers located in remote data centers, some WAN optimization gear can terminate the SSL sessions, shrink the traffic and re-encrypt it for the next leg of the trip. These chains of encrypted sessions introduce potential vulnerabilities that different vendors address in different ways.
SSL traffic represents a growing percentage of total traffic on WAN
links, according to Forrester Research. So SSL support in WAN
optimization appliances will become more important to businesses that
want to keep traffic secure while minimizing the size of their WAN
links.
In a survey last month of 1,300 IT executives by WAN-optimization vendor Blue Coat Systems, one-third of respondents said that 25% of their WAN traffic is SSL. And of those surveyed, 45% plan to roll out more SSL
applications this year.
About
a third of all WAN traffic at Richardson Partners Financial Ltd. in
Toronto is SSL, says Andrew McKinney, director of technical services
for the firm. But if only the urgent business traffic is considered,
the percentage is much higher. "For critical business traffic, it's all
encrypted," he says. So he uses Blue Coat Systems gear to secure
traffic and optimize it for good performance.
1:45:40 PM 
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