IPsec
Technology & Computing abbreviation · Networking
| Stands for | Internet Protocol Security |
|---|---|
| Categories | Technology & Computing |
IPsec stands for Internet Protocol Security, a networking abbreviation.
A suite of protocols that authenticates and encrypts IP packets, widely used for site-to-site VPNs between offices and clouds and for some remote-access VPNs. It negotiates keys with IKE and protects traffic with ESP, in either tunnel mode or transport mode.
Example: The AWS site-to-site connection uses two IPsec tunnels for redundancy.
Usage notes
Developed by the IETF in the 1990s, originally alongside IPv6; the current architecture is RFC 4301 (2005). The Authentication Header protocol provides integrity without encryption and is rarely used now. IPsec struggles with NAT, so NAT traversal wraps it in UDP port 4500. Written with a lowercase "sec".
Related abbreviations
More networking abbreviations
- IANA – Internet Assigned Numbers Authority
- ICANN – Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
- ICMP – Internet Control Message Protocol
- IETF – Internet Engineering Task Force
- IMAP – Internet Message Access Protocol
- IP – Internet Protocol
- IPv4 – Internet Protocol version 4
- IPv6 – Internet Protocol version 6
- IRC – Internet Relay Chat
- IS-IS – Intermediate System to Intermediate System
- iSCSI – Internet Small Computer Systems Interface
- ISP – Internet service provider