Patent ID: 11863544
Assignee: SIEMENS AKTIENGESELLSCHAFT
Field: Digital communication (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC H | IPC G  H

Claim 0:
1. A method for authenticating nodes of a communication network of an automation installation, the communication network containing the nodes in a form of Ethernet bridges and electronic devices, each of the nodes having at least two communication ports, which comprises the steps of:
transmitting respective authentication information indicating the nodes to an authentication server and the authentication server taking the respective authentication information as a basis for admitting or rejecting the nodes in the communication network as subscribers, the transmitting step including the substeps of:
executing, via the communication network, a spanning tree protocol, which involves at least one of the nodes being instructed to take an operating state of the communication network as a basis for blocking or activating at least one of the communication ports for operational data traffic, at least two of the nodes use mutually facing said communication ports to interchange authentication requests containing the respective authentication information;
sending, via the at least two nodes, the respective authentication information received to the authentication server connected to the communication network; and
using, via the authentication server, the respective authentication information received to perform a respective check on an authenticity of a respective node of the nodes and admits or rejects the respective node in the communication network as the subscriber as a result of the respective check.