I have a VPN between two SonicWALLs. I use it mainly to send a large amount of .tif images between the two networks. Initially I set the encryption to 3DES, because the images contain confidential information. This made the transfer of the images very slow. When I changed it to DES it sped up the tranmittion significantly.
I am still pretty new at the security stuff, so here's my questions: Is DES 'secure enough'? Should the TYPE of files being sent over a VPN determine the strength of the security used? In other words, should the fact that I send images primarily over the VPN instead of text or other files change what level of encryption I use?
From what I know, DES selects a key from about 72 quadrillion possibilities, using the public-private key encryption, so I don't know if it even matters what I'm encrypting, DES picks a random key for any type of file... but I'm not sure about this.
Thanks ahead of time,
BlackHatHunter