Patent ID: 7937762

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving, by a first computing device, a request for credentials from an unauthenticated second computing device, said request including a machine identifier associated with the unauthenticated second computing device; issuing the credentials for association with the machine identifier; associating the issued credentials with the machine identifier; assigning a credential group identifier to the machine identifier; associating the issued credentials with the assigned credential group identifier; and associating the machine identifier and the credential group identifier with data operations associated with the unauthenticated second computing device to enable identification of the unauthenticated computing device as the source of the data operations, wherein the association among the credentials, the machine identifier, and the credential group identifier persists across communication sessions between the first computing device and the unauthenticated second computing device, and wherein the first computing device modifies the credential group identifier responsive to the issuance of additional credentials for the unauthenticated second computing device; wherein the unauthenticated second computing device is one of a plurality of computing devices communicating with the first computing device, and further comprising: identifying a particular computing device from the plurality of computing devices and identifying a particular credential group identifier associated with the particular computing device; identifying data operations associated with the particular computing device via a machine identifier associated with the particular computing device and via the particular credential group identifier; and identifying the data operations associated with an unauthenticated computing device based on the machine identifier and the credential group identifier; mitigating the identified data operations to restore data integrity by deleting data associated with a particular credential group identifier in response to the identified operations associated with the particular credential group identifier being invalid.