Patent ID: 8804504

Claim:
A method of reducing processing required to transmit a data packet over a virtual private network, the method comprising: receiving, at a network transmitting device, an initial encapsulated data packet to be transmitted over an established Virtual Private Network (VPN) tunnel connection to a receiving device; removing, at the network transmitting device, from the initial encapsulated data packet, a Layer 2 (L 2 ) protocol header and at least one framing element selected from a front end delimiter or a back end delimiter; appending, at the network transmitting device, an alternate encapsulated protocol header to an Internet Protocol (IP) data packet of the initial encapsulated data packet to generate a modified encapsulated data packet, wherein the alternate encapsulated protocol header contains processing information for the IP data packet, the processing information comprising at least a payload length of the IP data packet; and sending, with the network transmitting device, the modified encapsulated data packet to the receiving device over the VPN tunnel connection, wherein the alternate encapsulated protocol header is configured to allow the receiving device to handle the IP data packet in the modified encapsulated data packet using less computational resources in comparison to handling the initial encapsulated data packet.