I found this ( http://journal.paul.querna.org/articles/2011/04/05/openssl-memory-use/ ) just a tad disturbing. The TLDR is that OpenSSL automatically sets compression on for SSL connections. That’s great if you’re trying to cut down on bandwidth… but not so great when thinking about both Memory and CPU utilization, definitely more so memory in this case.

Fortunately the post author and company created some partial duct tape solutions for anyone suffering under out of memory issues in their infrastructure.