Patent ID: 9001661
Filing Date: 2015-04-07
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. A method for a network security device comprising: receiving, by a processor of the network security device, a data packet having a header and content; determining whether the data packet is associated with a flow that is known based on both the header information and the content; in the event that the data packet is not associated with a flow that is known: associating a new session identifier with the data packet; determining whether the data packet should be allowed based on the new session identifier; and in the event that the data packet should be allowed, generating a new flow record associated with the data packet, the new flow record including information for the new session identifier associated with the data packet; initially classifying a flow associated with the packet using information included in the header and content; and updating the initial classification of the flow based on a processing of one or more packets of the flow, wherein the processing includes one or more of content based protocol decoding, content based object extraction, or content based pattern matching.