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IPsec overhead question

We have an IPsec s2s tunnel between two FTD units (one physical, one virtual). When you do show cry ipsec sa peer X.X.X.X, there's a part in the output that shows you the IPsec overhead. But it shows two values and that's what is confusing me. See below underlined portion below:

local crypto endpt.: X.X.X.X/XXXX, remote crypto endpt.: X.X.X.X/XXXX
path mtu 1500, ipsec overhead 63(44), media mtu 1500
PMTU time remaining (sec): 0, DF policy: copy-df
ICMP error validation: disabled, TFC packets: disabled

Is this telling me that the overall IPsec overhead is 63 bytes? What does the 44 in parentheses indicate?

6 Replies 6

as I know 
ipsec overhead 63(44)

44 for SHA 
63 for AES

44 Bytes are the header overhead. This could be build by:

  • 20 Byte new IP header
  • 8 Byte NAT-T
  • 4 Byte SPI
  • 4 Byte Sequence number
  • 8 Byte IV (assuming you use AES-GCM)

63 Bytes is the overhead if we also add the ESP trailer with

  • 1 Byte Padding
  • 1 Byte Pad length
  • 1 Byte Next header
  • 16 Byte ICV

So if that is true we are looking at 107 bytes of IPsec overhead on top of IP and TCP payloads. Am I interpreting that correctly?

I think I misread that. 63 is the total overhead you are describing. Sorry, I hadn't had my morning coffee yet!

coffee first always. LoL..


@MatthewHickey7355 wrote:

Sorry, I hadn't had my morning coffee yet!


Why do you do such things? That's dangerous ...