Patent ID: 8873555

Claim:
A method of processing data packets in a network, the method comprising: receiving a data packet at a network interface from a source device requesting access to a resource provided in the network; extracting from the data packet a source address of the source device and a destination address of a destination device to which the data packet is to be transmitted; performing a first query in an address database to retrieve a first device category associated with the source address, the first device category being of a plurality of first device categories of devices requesting access to resources in the network; performing a second query in the address database to retrieve a second device category associated with the destination address, the second device category being of a plurality of second device categories of devices providing the resources in the network; determining a command to assign the data packet in response to the source address being associated with the first device category and the destination address being associated with the second device category, the command identifying how to process the data packet; and assigning the command to the data packet.