What are the phases of TLS?

What does TLS 1.1 and 1.2 mean?

Here is a quick tutorial how to identify and then test your site for TLS version support.

TLS version, TLS 1.1 and TLS 1.2 are different standards and protocols which came into being to improve security on the internet protocol that provides a connection between a server and client device. Both standards have the same purpose but have different algorithms for their use.2 is an extension to TLS 1.1 while TLS 1.1 is an extension to SSL 3.0.2 is an improvement of SSL 3.0 so it comes with improvements such as ciphersuites that were not supported by SSL 3.

SSL 3.0 was designed to be backwards compatible with SSL 1.0 protocols.1 is an improvement of SSL 3.0 which is backward compatible with TLS 1.0 protocols while TLS 1.1 which is backward compatible with the protocols TLS 1.0 and TLS 1. There are also other types of protocols which share the same purpose and encryption for both TLS 1.

The two most important differences between the two standard protocols are in the algorithms used and in the cipher suites.2 support AES 256 which was not available in SSL 3.

There are also several other differences such as improvements to the random number generation (RNG) to help identify the server's certificate and encryption algorithm as well as a support for authentication and cipher suites. How do TLS 1.1 and 1.2 work?

First, let's take a look at what SSL and TLS actually are. The way TLS works is that the client and server (or client and website, or browser) negotiate security with each other and agree on a mutual SSL or TLS encryption.

The first thing that the client or browser needs to know is the servers or website names and certificates it needs to talk to. The browser, for example, uses the Host header and/or the HTTP GET or POST request to determine if the website has TLS support. After finding out the address and port to talk to, the browser sends an hello message which is encrypted and sent to the server.

What are the phases of TLS?

What is it?

A phase of the Tor project is any period during which we have an established, documented, and supported development policy. We define our development phases as the periods in which we actively develop the Tor software.

What are the four phases of Tor? Tor 0.2 was released in June 2026. Since then we have:

Tor 0.3 in March 2026.4 in September 2026.

Tor 1.0 in January 2026.1 in February 2026.

There is no official name for the state of the Tor project that immediately follows a Tor release. There have been plenty of calls to abandon the "tor" name (see below), but so far we haven't.

Can I start a phase? We welcome everyone who wants to help out by participating in the phases of the Tor project. You don't need to be a core developer to start working on a phase, or to start helping out with documentation, testing, and bug fixes.

How do I start a phase? If you want to participate in the phase, first talk to someone in #tor on Freenode IRC, the mailing list, or other places where people talk about the project. Then see the policy that describes how to help out in that phase.

The current phase, Tor 1.3, lasted from January 21st 2026 to January 21st 2026. If you'd like to work on a new phase, ask about what's needed on the mailing list. Once the discussion has died down, post a proposal to add yourself to the table.

Proposals to add the first half of a new phase should go on the mailing list. The second half of a new phase will start once there is sufficient discussion to begin accepting proposals for new phases.

How are phases managed? There is a new tor-dev mailing list on which decisions about phases are announced, and the phases themselves are discussed. For the most part, you don't need to think about when a phase starts or ends. You need to take the Tor 1.1 release as a reference point, because it is the longest continuously supported release we've ever had.

A phase ends on the 21st of the month after the last release of the phase.

How many steps are in a TLS handshake?

The short answer is five.

Long Answer. The original TLS protocol (1) used a handshake with six exchanges: Receive Client Hello from the server (2). Receive Server Hello from the server (3). Receive Client Hello from the client (4). Receive Certificate from the client (5). Receive Server Certificate from the server (6). This number was increased to seven when DTLS was introduced, allowing a client to encrypt a hello request with its client hello (1). The number was further increased to nine in the Transport Layer Security (TLS) 1.2 specification (2).

Here are the steps in the current specification: Server hello (1). Client hello (2). Server hello replay (3). Client hello replay (4). Certificate request (5). Certificate request reply (6). Certificate (7). Certificate (8). Server finished (9). Finished (10). Server change cipher spec (11). Change cipher spec (12). Finished change cipher spec (13). Change cipher spec (14). Client finished (15). Finished (16). Client change cipher spec (17). Finished change cipher spec (18). Change cipher spec (19). Change cipher spec (20). Finished change cipher spec (21). Change cipher spec (22). Finished change cipher spec (23). Change cipher spec (24). Finished change cipher spec (25). Change cipher spec (26). Finished change cipher spec (27). Change cipher spec (28). Finished change cipher spec (29). Change cipher spec (30). Finished change cipher spec (31). The following tables show the number of records for each exchange in each of the stages. START of record. Note that a record is a packet of data, including its packet headers. The following tables show how many bytes of data are contained in each packet header and how many records in each packet header.