Patent ID: 8117335
Filing Date: 2012-02-14
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. A smart router for processing network traffic at any network level, comprising: a message inspection module of the smart router, the smart router handling communications between endpoints of a communications network, the message inspection module operable to receive a message and determine identification information about the message; and a policy enforcement module of the smart router operable to dynamically determine from a plurality of policies a policy to enforce on the message based at least in part upon the identification information obtained by the message inspection module, the policy enforcement module being further operable to process the dynamically determined policy, wherein the plurality of policies is set by at least one of a service layer and an application of the service layer, wherein determining which policy to enforce is based at least in part on operations being performed at the service layer, wherein the policy enforcement module is further operable to delegate tasks needed to complete enforcing the policy on the message to a module outside of the router, wherein the tasks of needed to complete enforcement of the policy comprise one or more of transport tasks, service tasks, and processing tasks, and wherein the policy enforcement module delegates transport tasks to a transport layer, delegates service tasks to the service layer, and delegates processing tasks to a message processing module.