Patent ID: 8451750

Claim:
A packet switching device, comprising: one or more processors; and memory; wherein said one or more processors are configured to perform operations, with said operations including: validation processing including: validating a route in response to determining that the originating autonomous system specified for the route in a received Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) update message has authority to advertise the route; and invalidating the route in response to determining that the originating autonomous system specified for the route in a received BGP update message does not have the authority to advertise the route; adding a value to a particular BGP update packet for communication to another packet switching device, wherein a first value of the value explicitly identifies that the originating autonomous system was validated, and wherein a second value of the value explicitly identifies that the originating autonomous system was invalidated; and sending the particular BGP update packet, with said added value, to said another packet switching device; wherein the BGP update message is received by the packet switching device from a BGP peer device; and wherein said received BGP update message includes an advertisement of the route from the BGP peer device.