IB TWS - SSL vs no SSL question

Discussion in 'Trading Software' started by fader, May 1, 2006.

  1. fader

    fader

    can anyone comment on the performance with / without SSL, is there any significant difference with order executions? i'd like to switch to SSL but it would be great to hear any comments before i go live with it.

    also, i am not a security expert - can anyone confirm / explain whether enabling SSL will indeed significantly improve the security of my data transmission, i.e. i guess i'd like to know whether the benefits of enabling SSL outweigh any possible deterioration in performance - thanks in advance.
     
  2. ddunbar

    ddunbar Guest

    I've run both and have seen no material effect on performance. I currently run SSL. Here's an important tip. If when you switch to SSL and you can't log on, it's because your ISP assigned IP address won't support TWS's SSL. Happened to me once when I changed my IP by changing the MAC address on my router (which changes the IP).

    Are there benefits to using SSL? Depends on your set up. I have a WIFI G network set up which uses WPA security. Yet I still run SSL. But the Wifi is connected to a Cable modem which of course is a shared network. For that reason, I use the SSL.

    If you have DSL, you may not need it.
     
  3. SSL is vastly more secure. Casual sniffing of encrypted network traffic is unlikely to turn up anything of any use to an attacker.

    I think it unlikely that it would have any significant impact on performance - especially at the PC end. Depending on the overall system load at the server end, there *might* be some effect there, but that seems fairly unlikely as well.
     
  4. fader

    fader

    thanks, folks, really appreciate the feedback - i have looked up a couple of older threads and it looks like people used to have problems logging in with SSL, but hopefully this has been resolved by now - i have tried running with SSL for a couple of hours today and i can't see any difference, hopefully this will continue to work fine - thanks again for your help, all the best.
     
  5. I find the SSL button on login screen in TWS confusing. By default, it is on the left side and SSL looks disabled! This looks like a serious security flaw. Or did I read this button position wrong? Checkbox would be much more clear solution.

    Can someone advise, if it is to the left, is SSL enabled or disabled?