Patent ID: 8281122

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: circuitry to at least one of generate, at least in part, and receive, at least in part, a packet, the packet including at least one field and an encrypted payload, the at least one field including, at least in part, at least one of a first key and at least one value, the at least one of the first key and at least one value, as included in the at least one field, being encrypted by a second key, the encrypted payload being capable of being decrypted, at least in part, based, at least in part, upon the at least one of the first key and the at least one value to yield an unencrypted payload, the unencrypted payload including at least a portion of application layer data, the application layer data to be communicated in a secure session; the at least one field comprising at least one of: one or more protocol header option fields; and one or more protocol header reserved fields; the circuitry to be comprised, at least in part, in a network node that is to be communicatively coupled to another network node that is to receive the packet; if the another network node is incapable of processing the at least one field and is to operate in accordance with a technique that does not utilize the at least one field, the circuitry is to remove from the packet the at least one field to generate another packet that lacks the at least one field so as to permit the another packet to be backward compatible with the another network node, and the circuitry is to issue, at least in part, the another packet to the another network node; the packet being one of a plurality of packets that comprise respective encrypted transmission control protocol payloads, respective fields, and respective values, the respective fields and respective values including information to permit the circuitry to perform packet-by-packet decryption, inspection, and validity check of each of the respective encrypted transmission control protocol payloads independently of others of the respective encrypted transmission control protocol payloads and without first re-assembling an entirety of the application layer data; and if the another network node is capable of processing the at least one field, the information being to provide to the another network node cryptographic state and hash value information based upon an entirely of the application layer data.