Patent ID: 7969908

Claim:
A method, comprising: sending, from a first provider edge (PE) router in a provider network, a first ping request targeting at least one first device in a virtual private network (VPN) that belongs to a multicast group; sending, from a second PE router in the provider network, a second ping request targeting at least one second device in the VPN that belongs to the multicast group; determining whether the at least one first device in the VPN is connected to the at least one second device in the VPN based on ping responses received as a result of the first and second ping requests, wherein the determining indicates that the second device is connected to the first device and is not connected to a third device in the VPN; and deploying one or more network probes in the VPN based on the determining, such that a network probe is deployed to monitor traffic between the first device and the second device in the VPN, and such that no network probe is deployed to monitor traffic between the second device and the third device in the VPN.