When the SPI is configured as a slave, the Slave Select (SS) pin is always input. When SS is held low, the SPI is activated, and MISO becomes an output if configured so by the user. All other pins are inputs. When SS is driven high, all pins are inputs, and the SPI is passive, which means that it will not receive incoming data. The SPI logic will be reset once the SS pin is driven high.
The SS pin is useful for packet/byte synchronization to keep the slave bit counter synchronous with the master clock generator. When the SS pin is driven high, the SPI slave will immediately reset the send and receive logic, and drop any partially received data in the Shift register.