Keysight Secure Instrument Communication provides a secure way to control instruments using HiSLIP protocol revision 2.0 (r2). HiSLIP r2 enables secure connections, which are achieved using the Transport Layer Security (TLS) for encryption and decryption. HiSLIP r2 also enables authentication: the server (instrument) authenticates its identity by sending an X.509 certificate to the client (VISA library) when the TLS connection is established. The client authenticates to the server using a server-supported SASL (Simple Authentication and Security Layer) mechanism.

The challenges to establish a secure connection are: how to proffer the required certificates and authentication information, how to authenticate server/client mutually, and how to configure server/client compatibly, etc.

To overcome the challenges and support secure communication between instruments and test stations, Keysight is providing updates to certain instruments and Keysight IO Libraries Suite. Keysight also provides a configuration tool called Keysight Secure Instrument Communication (SIC) Expert to configure both instruments and test stations to perform secure communication.

Keysight Secure Instrument Communication system consists of three main elements: