Patent ID: 8339997

Claim:
A method for adding a telephone participant to a multi-participant audio-video conference, the method comprising: sending a first message to each of a plurality of multicast appliances over the Internet, wherein the first message comprises a group address which identifies a plurality of participants; each of the multicast appliances receiving the first message; establishing a plurality of virtual private networks across the Internet routes between the multicast appliances; enabling at least one of the participants to communicate in the multi-participant video conferences; the telephone participant joining the multi-participant video conference, wherein said joining comprises: the telephone participant calling into a gateway server; the telephone participant providing conference ID information; the gateway server establishing communication with a conferencing server; authenticating the telephone participant; and transmitting multicast group information to the gateway server; wherein the gateway server is operable to use the multicast group information to enable the telephone participant to participate in the multi-participant video conference.