The Encryption Gap: Why Networks Need a New Generation of Data Protection

For decades, encryption protecting our nation’s most sensitive data followed a simple life cycle. Encryptors were installed in racks, configured and left mostly untouched. Data moved at megabit speeds across networks a fraction of today’s size and against adversaries operating on timelines measured in months, not minutes.

That World No Longer Exists. 

Today’s defense networks carry exponentially more data, expanding sensor grids, cloud platforms, AI adoption and edge devices.

The intelligence community’s infrastructure demands throughput in the hundreds of gigabits per second, growing to terabit-class speeds on the horizon. Simultaneously, adversaries are more sophisticated, persistent and increasingly capable of exploiting cryptographic vulnerabilities once considered theoretical. 

The encryption layer has become one of the most consequential chokepoints in the modern defense enterprise. If encryption can’t keep pace with the speed, scale and agility that today’s missions demand, nothing downstream works as intended. 

The Throughput Problem 

The challenge facing network architects is deceptively simple to state and enormously difficult to solve: classified data needs to move faster than ever without compromising security. For the warfighter, latency isn’t a technical inconvenience. It’s an operational penalty that can cost lives. Legacy encryption solutions, stretched beyond their original design, create chokepoints where data slows and scalability dead ends, producing the kind of fragility adversaries seek to exploit. 

Why Layer 2 Ethernet Encryption

High-assurance internet protocol encryptors (HAIPE) remain essential to securing classified communications. But for high-speed data center interconnects, cloud-to-cloud traffic and AI workload movement, Layer 3 HAIPE encryption introduces unavoidable tradeoffs. Layer 2 Ethernet Data Encryption (EDE) secures data directly at the Ethernet frame, closer to the physical transport layer, delivering greater throughput efficiency and a stronger fit for high-performance networks. 

Layer 2 EDE complements Layer 3 HAIPE; it doesn’t replace it. For high-bandwidth, latency-sensitive classified traffic, Layer 2 EDE addresses requirements that Layer 3 alone cannot. This distinction defines the TACLANE® E-Series. 

“The TACLANE E-Series was designed to answer a straightforward question: What does the next generation of high assurance encryption need to look like?” said Todd Warton, vice president of Customer Accounts and Global Solutions at General Dynamics Mission Systems. “The answer is an agile, modular encryption platform that lets organizations add or swap crypto modules, scale throughput up to 800 Gb/s, while introducing new capabilities without taking the network offline. This is all while occupying less space and drawing less power than ever before.”  

The question then becomes how to get there. 

From Available to Operational 

Modernizing enterprise encryption infrastructure is not just a technology decision; it is an operational transition. General Dynamics Mission Systems helps organizations move from evaluation to deployment with less risk by reducing configurations, improving integration and using pre-production demonstrations that validate form, fit and function before rollout.  

Embracing a technology transition opens exciting opportunities, and the true challenge lies not in the technology itself, but in the way we navigate the organizational, logistical and human aspects. When these factors align, your capable product transforms into a successful operational reality, and it does so at lightning speed. 

The Bigger Picture 

The TACLANE E-Series arrives at a moment when the defense community is confronting significant challenges. Networks are expanding, data volumes are exploding and the cryptographic foundations that have secured classified communications for decades are facing existential challenges. The encryption layer sits at the intersection of all of them. If networks can’t deliver the speed, security, efficiency and scalability that the modern mission demands, every other investment in network modernization is undermined. 

TACLANE E-Series Ethernet encryption delivers speed, scalability and the most secure high-assurance product available. This is not just any encryption product; it’s built to tackle today’s most pressing threats while being ready for what’s on the horizon. 

The data is growing and moving faster. The adversaries are here. And the time to act is now. 

To learn more about TACLANE products, assist with technical information and answer general inquiries on our products, programs and services, please visit: gdmissionsystems.com/taclane