Patent ID: 7080116
Filing Date: 2006-07-18
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. A network architecture for selectively blocking access to a pay per use wide area network comprising: at least one server that provides access to the wide area network; a connection sharing computer in communication with the server, wherein the connection sharing computer accesses the wide area network; at least one network device comprising a network protocol address in a specific network protocol address range determined by the connection sharing computer, the network device in communication with the connection sharing computer, wherein the connection sharing computer provides access to the wide area network to the network device; and at least one network protocol sniffer module in communication with the server, wherein the network protocol sniffer pings the network device in the specific network protocol address range to determine a presence of the network device and communicates the presence to the server such that access to the wide area network by the network device may be selectively blocked by disconnecting the connection sharing computer from the wide area network.