Multiple-channel security architecture and its implementation over SSL

Abstract

This paper presents multiple-channel SSL (MC-SSL), an architecture and protocol for protecting client-server communications. In contrast to SSL, which provides a single end-to-end secure channel, MC-SSL enables applications to employ multiple channels, each with its own cipher suite and data-flow direction. Our approach also allows for several partially trusted application proxies. The main advantages of MC-SSL over SSL are (a) support for end-to-end security in the presence of partially trusted proxies, and (b) selective data protection for achieving computational efficiency important to resource-constrained clients and heavily loaded servers.