Patent · US Active

System and method for host-initiated firewall discovery in a network environment

US8800024B2 · kind B2 · utility

35Cited by
140References
24Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateOct 17, 2011
Grant dateAug 5, 2014
Priority date
Expiry dateOct 17, 2031

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
  • CPC primaryH04L63/0254
  • WIPO fieldDigital communication
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

A method is provided in one example embodiment that includes intercepting a network flow to a destination node having a network address and sending a discovery query based on a discovery action associated with the network address in a firewall cache. A discovery result may be received and metadata associated with the flow may be sent to a firewall before releasing the network flow. In other embodiments, a discovery query may be received from a source node and a discovery result sent to the source node, wherein the discovery result identifies a firewall for managing a route to a destination node. Metadata may be received from the source node over a metadata channel. A network flow from the source node to the destination node may be intercepted, and the metadata may be correlated with the network flow to apply a network policy to the network flow.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.