Patent ID: 11962685
Assignee: RAYTHEON COMPANY
Field: Digital communication (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC H | IPC H

Claim 0:
1. A large-scale Ethernet mesh network comprising:
a plurality of dual-mode peer devices, each of the dual-mode peer devices implementing an authenticator port access state machine (PACP SM) and a supplicant PACP SM each configured to operate in accordance with a modified Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.1X standard for port-based network access control, the plurality of dual-mode peer devices in signal communication with one another so as to establish a group connectivity association (CA), the authenticator PACP SM and the supplicant PACP SM configured to simultaneously operate in a supplicant mode and authenticator mode, respectively, to ensure continued presence of at least one of the dual-mode peer devices operating as an authenticator in the group CA,
wherein each of dual-mode peer device is configured to encrypt data using a shared group encryption key (SAK), and to exchange the encrypted data with peer devices in the group CA, and
wherein the plurality of dual-mode peer devices are configured to continue operation of the group CA in response to one or more of the dual-mode peer devices leave the group CA,
wherein the remaining dual-mode peer devices continue simultaneously operating in the supplicant mode and the authenticator mode after the one or more of the dual-mode peer devices leave the group CA, and wherein at least one of the remaining dual-mode peer devices is selected as a newly elected key server in response to a key server change event, and the newly elected key server delivers a new group of Connectivity Association Keys (CAKs) to ensure the integrity of the group CAKs lifetime.