# IP Security Offloading

Internet Protocol (IP) Security (IPSec) is a set of protocols used to help secure the exchange of IP data. IP Security offloading is the assignment of algorithm computations from software to hardware. Generally, CPU utilization decreases and network performance increases when offloading takes place.

On Intel devices that support IPSec offloading features, you can configure those features through Intel® PROSet. For more information, select Intel PROSet in the Table of Contents (left pane) of this window.

| NOTE: Large Send Offload (LSO) and IPSec Offload are not compatible. LSO is automatically disabled when IPSec Offload is enabled. This may reduce the performance of non-IPSec traffic. Confining all of your IPSec traffic to one port and enabling IPSec Offload only on that port may mitigate this issue. On Microsoft Windows 8/Server 2012 and later, devices based on the 82576, 82599, and X540 controllers are not affected by this issue.