Patent ID: 9729408
Date: 2017-08-08
CPC Classifications: H04L

Claim:
1. A device comprising: a plurality of ingress ports configured to receive a traffic flow of captured data packets from a source of captured data packets and transmit the traffic flow of captured data packets to a switch; a plurality of egress ports configured to receive selectively encapsulated captured data packets from the switch and transmit selectively encapsulated captured data packets from the device toward an external device via a communication network; the switch communicatively coupled to the plurality of ingress ports, the plurality of egress ports, and at least one of a logic component and a processor and configured to transfer captured data packets received from the plurality of ingress ports to the at least one logic component and processor and transfer data and selectively encapsulated captured data packets from the at least one logic component and processor to the plurality of egress ports; the at least one logic component and processor, communicatively coupled to the switch and configured to receive captured data packets from the switch, execute instructions stored in a memory, wherein execution of the instructions includes selectively encapsulating the received captured data packets for transmission to the external device via the communication network, and transmitting selectively encapsulated captured data packets to the external device, wherein said selective encapsulating comprises analyzing the received captured data packets in order to determine a characteristic associated with the received captured data packets, determining, based on the characteristic, whether to encapsulate the received captured data packets, and incorporating address information that is determined from the determined characteristic into the selectively encapsulated captured data packets responsive to the determination, wherein the characteristic is selected from the group consisting of: size of the received captured data packets, type of the received captured data packets, density of captured data packets included within the traffic flow and encryption information associated with the received captured data packets; and a memory, communicatively coupled to the at least one logic component and processor and configured to store instructions executable by the at least one logic component and processor.