Patent ID: 8804720

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving, by a network device, a first multicast service signaling message that specifies a multicast group; determining, by a data plane of the network device, that the first multicast service signaling message carries layer three (L3) multicast service signaling information; determining, by the data plane of the network device, whether the first multicast service signaling message was received on a first layer two (L2) interface connecting the network device to an upstream services router or on a second L2 interface connecting the network device to a downstream subscriber device; in response to determining that the first multicast service signaling message was received on the first L2 interface connecting the network device to the upstream services router, filtering, by the data plane of the network device, the first multicast service signaling message to a control plane of the network device for processing by the control plane of the network device; and modifying, by the control plane of the network device, multicast filter information in the data plane of the network device in accordance with the L3 multicast service signaling information to affect replication and forwarding, to the downstream subscriber device, by the data plane of the network device, multicast traffic associated with the multicast group.