Patent ID: 7072337

Claim:
A method for traffic gating in a computer network comprising a plurality of distributed subnets, the method comprising: receiving a first protocol message on a broadcast monitoring network device from a first network device, the first protocol request message comprising an address resolution request for a second network device; generating a second first protocol message on the broadcast monitoring network device, the second first protocol request message comprising a second address resolution request for the second network device; sending the second first protocol message from the broadcast monitoring network device; determining whether a response message to the second first protocol message is received on the broadcast monitoring network device; if not, determining a network subnet associated with the first network device; determining a network address of a network element arranged to provide traffic gating to network devices on the network subnet associated with the first network device; generating a first protocol reply message on the broadcast monitoring network device, the first protocol reply message comprising the network address of the network element arranged to provide traffic gating to the first network device; and sending the first protocol reply message from the broadcast monitoring network device to the first network device.