Patent ID: 8867549

Claim:
A method for execution in a peer-to-peer hybrid network comprising: performing, by the first endpoint, an authentication process with an access server to gain access to network information needed to communicate within the peer-to-peer hybrid network, wherein the authentication process presents unique user authentication information by the first endpoint to the access server and associates the first endpoint with the unique user authentication information within the network; determining, by the first endpoint, that the unique user authentication information is concurrently associated with a second endpoint that is logged into the network, whereby the second endpoint previously presented the unique user authentication information to the access server in order to log in to the network; identifying, by the first endpoint, the first endpoint as a master endpoint corresponding to the unique user authentication information and the second endpoint as either a slave endpoint or an inactive master endpoint corresponding to the unique user authentication information; sending, by the first endpoint, a first message directly to the second endpoint to notify the second endpoint that the first endpoint is the master endpoint; and sending, by the first endpoint, a second message directly to a third endpoint that is logged into the network to notify the third endpoint that communications sent from the third endpoint to a user of the first and second endpoints should be sent to the first endpoint only.