Wave Issue 0511 3/18/05 Article 8-01

***Network General's New SSL Protocol Decode Helps Ensure Optimal
Performance of Secure Online Transactions

SAN JOSE, Calif.
March 15, 2005

As the amount of data transmitted over the Internet continues to
grow, it is essential that this information remains secure, while
also making sure that network bottlenecks don't arise to inhibit
these transactions. Network General Corporation has announced the
capability to decode the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol to
help ensure transactions are processed securely and seamlessly.

The SSL protocol is the de facto means for securely transmitting
data over the Internet. The protocol is integrated into every
browser and every Web server, allowing users to interact with Web
sites in a secure manner. However, due to the processing-
intensive authentication schemes and encryption/decryption
algorithms, even if SSL functions are offloaded to a proxy
server, performance on the proxy and the Web server can be
significantly degraded jeopardizing customer satisfaction in the
process.

Part of the industry's widest-array of protocol decodes, Network
General's SSL protocol decode gives IT professionals the unique
ability to look at configuration and timing issues associated
with SSL transactions. IT professionals can reassemble and view
the components of SSL traffic in order to determine if a problem
is occurring during the set-up of the transaction or during the
actual data transfer, then drill down to the specific problem
area and resolve it. A baseline can also be determined for
standard response times to show when traffic patterns are
abnormal giving IT professionals a proactive way to ensure
optimal performance. By looking at HTTP response times IT
professionals can measure how quickly a server is responding to
identify where, when and why a problem occurred enabling faster
time to resolution which ultimately ensures overall customer
satisfaction.

The Network General SSL v.3 protocol decode is available within
Sniffer Decode and Expert Pack 2 which is supported via an
inclusion or installation on InfiniStream 2.0, Sniffer Portable
4.8, Sniffer Distributed 4.5, Sniffer Distributed s6000 v1.5, and
Netasyst Network Analyzer. Customers with a valid support
agreement can obtain Pack 2 from the Network General Web site.

www.networkgeneral.com