Patent ID: 7903671

Claim:
A method of facilitating a secure communication session between a first node and a second node the method comprising: (a) at a gateway, receiving a first request for a secure communication session with the second node from the first node that does not reside behind the gateway, wherein the second node does reside behind the gateway, and wherein the first request specifies an initiation of the secure communication session by the first node; (b) at the gateway, sending the first request to a Network Address Translation (NAT) traversal service associated with the second node, wherein the NAT traversal service associated with the second node is configured to, in response to the first request, send from the NAT traversal service a second request to the first node via the gateway, wherein the second request specifies an initiation of the secure communication session by the second node instead of the first node; (c) at the gateway, receiving the second request from the NAT traversal service associated with the second node; and (d) at the gateway, forming a pinhole based on the second request so as to allow responses received in response to the second request from the first node to reach the second node via the gateway.