Patent ID: 7106691

Claim:
In an Internet Protocol (IP) data network comprised of a plurality of interconnected routers, a method comprised of: receiving at a first router a plurality of IP data packets, the first router directly interconnected by a first plurality of data paths to a first sub-plurality of interconnected routers from the plurality of interconnected routers; tabulating at said first router a plurality of source counts of IP data packets, each source count of IP data packets of said plurality of source counts of IP data packets indicative of a count of packets received from a particular IP source during a first time interval, said plurality of source counts of IP data packets associated with every source that provides IP data packets to said first router; tabulating at said first router a plurality of destination counts of IP data packets, each destination count of IP data packets of said plurality of destination counts of IP data packets indicative of a count of packets routable to a particular IP destination address during said first time interval; storing each of said plurality of source counts and each of said plurality of destination counts in a memory device for subsequent processing; determining that a time-based data traffic measure exceeds a predetermined threshold, said time based traffic measure based upon a particular source count of said plurality of source counts; and responsive to said determining step, sending a message to a second router, said message adapted to instruct said second router to discard packets associated with said time-based traffic measure, wherein said second router is not a source router for said packets, the second router directly interconnected by a second plurality of data paths to a second sub-plurality of interconnected routers from the plurality of interconnected routers.