Patent ID: 8914410

Claim:
A method for managing resource access, the method comprising: storing information in memory regarding a plurality of resources, each resource associated with one or more requirements regarding access; receiving a request sent over a communication network, the request concerning access by a user to a requested resource; receiving an indication over the communication network that an identity of the user is valid; and executing instructions stored in memory, wherein execution of the instructions by a processor: identifies a path taken by the request through the communication network out of a plurality of possible paths, wherein each path is associated with a trust level, identifies an identification technique used to identify the user requesting access out of a plurality of possible identification techniques, wherein each identification technique is associated with a trust level, calculates an overall trust level of the request based on: the trust level of the identification technique used to identify the user, the trust level of the path taken by the access request through the network, and a trust level of an encryption technique used to encrypt the request out of a plurality of possible encryption techniques, recognizes that the encryption technique has a higher trust level than a trust level of a portion of the path, increases the overall trust level to the trust level of the encryption technique, and provides or refuses access to the requested resource based on whether the overall trust level of the request corresponds to requirements for accessing the resource.