Patent ID: 8347355

Claim:
A hosted multi-tenant centralized network management system (NMS) for delivering network services, said centralized NMS being adapted to authenticate customer premises equipment (CPE), wherein said CPE is deployed without a pre-shared key (PSK) or certificate, said CPE being coupled to an end user computer, said centralized NMS comprising: a login server, a memory device and a network management server; wherein said login server is adapted to generate a temporary PSK, store said temporary PSK associated with an identity of said CPE in a database in said memory device, and send a prompt for a device password to said end user computer, the generation of a temporary PSK being in response to receipt of an automatic authentication request over an internet connection from said end user computer, said automatic authentication request including said identity of said CPE; wherein said login server is further adapted to validate said device password received from said end user computer and send said temporary PSK to said CPE; wherein said network management server is adapted to validate said temporary PSK received from said CPE, and send an encrypted version of said device password to said CPE, said validation including identifying said CPE identity in said database, said encrypted version of said device password being an authentication token for subsequent communications between said CPE and said centralized NMS.