PQC TLS Transmission Cost Metrics - crt26/PQC-LEO GitHub Wiki
The TLS handshake transmission cost test measures the network data exchanged during TLS 1.3 handshakes for PQC, Hybrid-PQC, and classical configurations. PQC and Hybrid-PQC tests use signing-algorithm/KEM pairings, while classical tests use signing-algorithm/key-exchange-group/ciphersuite combinations. The tool performs one handshake with one-way authentication and one handshake with mutual authentication for every configuration. The measurements are extracted from the summary produced by OpenSSL s_client output.
| Metric | Description |
|---|---|
| Bytes Sent | Number of bytes written by the TLS client during the handshake |
| Bytes Received | Number of bytes read by the TLS client during the handshake |
| Total Bytes | Sum of the bytes sent and received during the handshake |
Each result row also identifies the signature algorithm and authentication type (one_way_auth or mutual_auth). PQC and Hybrid-PQC rows identify the KEM algorithm; classical rows instead identify both the key-exchange group and ciphersuite. Unlike the TLS performance suite, this test records a single handshake per configuration and does not calculate run averages.
The get_pqc_tls_bytes.py script writes structured CSV data directly, so there is no unparsed result directory or additional parsing stage.
| Data Type | Description |
Location (relative to test_data/)
|
|---|---|---|
| PQC TLS Handshake Bytes | Transmission-cost results for PQC signature and KEM combinations | results/tls_handshake_bytes/machine_x/pqc_tls_handshake_bytes_results.csv |
| Hybrid-PQC TLS Handshake Bytes | Transmission-cost results for Hybrid-PQC signature and KEM combinations | results/tls_handshake_bytes/machine_x/hybrid_tls_handshake_bytes_results.csv |
| Classical TLS Handshake Bytes | Transmission-cost results for classical signature, key-exchange-group, and ciphersuite combinations | results/tls_handshake_bytes/machine_x/classic_tls_handshake_bytes_results.csv |
Where machine_x is the Machine-ID selected when the script is executed. If no custom Machine-ID is assigned, the default ID of 1 is used.