Patent ID: 7917586

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving a multimedia message from a user agent; setting a first index value of the multimedia message, wherein the first index value is set as a value to identify and discriminate the multimedia message from other multimedia messages, the first index value identifying a type of the multimedia message; storing the multimedia message having the set first index value in a storage device; receiving information including a second index value from the user agent, wherein the second index value is set to a first value that indicates whether a multimedia message to be forwarded is a new multimedia message or a changed multimedia message or is set to a second value that indicates that the multimedia message is a previously sent multimedia message; searching whether the multimedia message to be forwarded exists in the storage device based on a comparison of the second index value in the information received from the user agent and the first index value set in the stored multimedia message; and forwarding the multimedia message produced by the search, wherein, if a storing time of the multimedia message in the storage device elapses, the second index value is set as a value indicating a new multimedia message even though the multimedia message to be forwarded is a previously sent multimedia message, and wherein: the information including the second index value corresponds to a multimedia message includes first information and second information, the first information corresponds to header information and includes the second index value and the second information includes contents of the multimedia message, said contents including at least one of text or data, and said receiving includes receiving the header information without the second information of the multimedia message when the second index value corresponds to the second value.