Patent ID: 7549047

Claim:
A method comprising: preauthorizing a first device to communicate with at least one of a second device and a plurality of other devices by exchanging credentialing information via a secure network; and accessing at the first device at least one file accessible to the first device through a first file system, access to the at least one file is provided to the first file system via a secure channel over an unsecure network by at least one of the second device and the other devices upon the first file system authenticating itself using the credentialing information to a second file system on the second device or the other devices which store the at least one file being accessed, wherein the first device provides a list of devices it has received or provided preauthorization information to over the secure network to at least one of the second device and the other devices, at least one of the second device and the other devices that receive the list providing the list to at least one of the second device and the other devices that do not receive the list, and the list is associated with a list sequence number and each member on the list is associated with a member sequence number that is incremented as a member is added or deleted from the list, the list sequence number and each member sequence number used by at least one of the first device, the second device and the other devices to keep another list of member devices stored at the first device, the second device or the other devices substantially current.