Patent ID: 7818580

Claim:
A method of capturing connection information for a supplicant client coupled to an internal network, wherein said internal network comprises a connection information server that is coupled to an authentication switch, and wherein said authentication switch couples a supplicant client to an authentication server, said method comprising: the authentication switch prompting the connection information server to register the authentication switch to receive updated connection information; the authentication switch challenging the supplicant client for the supplicant client's identity; the authentication switch receiving the supplicant client's response to the challenge and transmitting the supplicant client's response to the authentication server; the authentication switch receiving a response from the authentication server indicating whether the supplicant client is authorized to access said internal network, wherein if the supplicant client is authorized the authentication switch: relays the authentication result to the supplicant client, and sends the supplicant client's ID and connection information to the connection information server; and the authentication switch transmitting, to an authentication database at the connection information server, the supplicant client's ID and updated connection information based on the registration of the authentication switch, wherein the authentication database is located within the internal network whose access is controlled by the authentication switch and the authentication server, wherein the authentication database is merged with connection information from other databases to create associations between client ID's, networked devices owned by the supplicant client, and at least one of a physical location of the networked devices, MAC addresses of the networked devices, and dynamic IP addresses of the networked devices, and wherein a manager of the internal network is enabled to utilize information in the authentication database and the associations to protect resources within the internal network.