To determine which encryption protocol and cipher are in use for an encrypted connection, use the following statements to check the values of the Ssl_version and Ssl_cipher status variables:

mysql> SHOW SESSION STATUS LIKE 'Ssl_version';
+---------------+-------+
| Variable_name | Value |
+---------------+-------+
| Ssl_version   | TLSv1 |
+---------------+-------+
mysql> SHOW SESSION STATUS LIKE 'Ssl_cipher';
+---------------+---------------------------+
| Variable_name | Value                     |
+---------------+---------------------------+
| Ssl_cipher    | DHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256 |
+---------------+---------------------------+

If the connection is not encrypted, both variables have an empty value.

MySQL supports encrypted connections using TLS protocols:

The value of the tls_version system variable determines which protocols the server is permitted to use from those that are available. The tls_version value is a comma-separated list containing one or more of these protocols (not case sensitive): TLSv1, TLSv1.1, TLSv1.2. By default, this variable lists all protocols supported by the SSL library used to compile MySQL (TLSv1,TLSv1.1,TLSv1.2 for OpenSSL, TLSv1,TLSv1.1 for yaSSL). To determine the value of tls_version at runtime, use this statement:

mysql> SHOW GLOBAL VARIABLES LIKE 'tls_version';
+---------------+-----------------------+
| Variable_name | Value                 |
+---------------+-----------------------+
| tls_version   | TLSv1,TLSv1.1,TLSv1.2 |
+---------------+-----------------------+

To change the value of tls_version, set it at server startup. For example, to prohibit connections that use the less-secure TLSv1 protocol, use these lines in the server my.cnf file:

[mysqld]
tls_version=TLSv1.1,TLSv1.2

To be even more restrict and permit only TLSv1.2 connections, set tls_version like this (assuming that your server is compiled using OpenSSL because yaSSL does not support TLSv1.2):

[mysqld]
tls_version=TLSv1.2

For client programs, the --tls-version option enables specifying the TLS protocols permitted per client invocation. The value format is the same as for tls_version.

By default, MySQL attempts to use the highest TLS protocol version available, depending on which SSL library was used to compile the server and client, which key size is used, and whether the server or client are restricted from using some protocols; for example, by means of tls_version/--tls-version:

If the server and client protocol capabilities have no protocol in common, the server terminates the connection request. For example, if the server is configured with tls_version=TLSv1.1,TLSv1.2, connection attempts will fail for clients invoked with --tls-version=TLSv1, and for older clients that do not support the --tls-version option and implicitly support only TLSv1.

To determine which ciphers a given server supports, use the following statement to check the value of the Ssl_cipher_list status variable:

SHOW SESSION STATUS LIKE 'Ssl_cipher_list';

The set of available ciphers depends on your MySQL version and whether MySQL was compiled using OpenSSL or yaSSL, and (for OpenSSL) the library version used to compile MySQL.

Order of ciphers passed by MySQL to the SSL library is significant. More secure ciphers are mentioned first in the list, and the first cipher supported by the provided certificate is selected.

MySQL passes this cipher list to OpenSSL:

ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256
ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384
ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256
ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384
ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA256
ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256
ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA384
ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384
DHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256
DHE-DSS-AES128-GCM-SHA256
DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256
DHE-DSS-AES128-SHA256
DHE-DSS-AES256-GCM-SHA384
DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA256
DHE-DSS-AES256-SHA256
ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA
ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA
ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA
ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA
DHE-DSS-AES128-SHA
DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA
TLS_DHE_DSS_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA
DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA
AES128-GCM-SHA256
DH-DSS-AES128-GCM-SHA256
ECDH-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256
AES256-GCM-SHA384
DH-DSS-AES256-GCM-SHA384
ECDH-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384
AES128-SHA256
DH-DSS-AES128-SHA256
ECDH-ECDSA-AES128-SHA256
AES256-SHA256
DH-DSS-AES256-SHA256
ECDH-ECDSA-AES256-SHA384
AES128-SHA
DH-DSS-AES128-SHA
ECDH-ECDSA-AES128-SHA
AES256-SHA
DH-DSS-AES256-SHA
ECDH-ECDSA-AES256-SHA
DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384
DH-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256
ECDH-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256
DH-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384
ECDH-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384
DH-RSA-AES128-SHA256
ECDH-RSA-AES128-SHA256
DH-RSA-AES256-SHA256
ECDH-RSA-AES256-SHA384
ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA
ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA
ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA
ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA
DHE-DSS-AES128-SHA
DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA
TLS_DHE_DSS_WITH_AES_256_CBC_SHA
DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA
AES128-SHA
DH-DSS-AES128-SHA
ECDH-ECDSA-AES128-SHA
AES256-SHA
DH-DSS-AES256-SHA
ECDH-ECDSA-AES256-SHA
DH-RSA-AES128-SHA
ECDH-RSA-AES128-SHA
DH-RSA-AES256-SHA
ECDH-RSA-AES256-SHA
DES-CBC3-SHA

MySQL passes this cipher list to yaSSL:

DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA
DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA
AES128-RMD
DES-CBC3-RMD
DHE-RSA-AES256-RMD
DHE-RSA-AES128-RMD
DHE-RSA-DES-CBC3-RMD
AES256-SHA
RC4-SHA
RC4-MD5
DES-CBC3-SHA
DES-CBC-SHA
EDH-RSA-DES-CBC3-SHA
EDH-RSA-DES-CBC-SHA
AES128-SHA:AES256-RMD

These cipher restrictions are in place:

If the server is started using a compatible certificate that uses any of the preceding restricted ciphers or cipher categories, the server starts with support for secure connections disabled.