Patent ID: 8832222

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving captured network traffic from at least one of an inline traffic capture point and a mirror port at a network captured traffic distribution device communicatively coupled to a plurality of network captured network traffic distribution devices arranged in a stacked topology, the captured network traffic being a copy of the network traffic flowing through a communication network; determining, by the network captured network traffic distribution device, a target destination of a data packet included in the captured network traffic, wherein there is at least one intervening network captured traffic distribution device in the stacked topology in-line between the network captured traffic distribution device and the target destination and wherein the data packet comprises at least a header, a payload and a frame check sequence associated with the data packet; inserting, by the network captured network traffic distribution device, a virtual local area network (VLAN) tag into the captured data packet responsively to the determined target destination, wherein the inserting includes updating the frame check sequence associated with the captured data packet to include information indicating that the captured data packet includes the inserted VLAN tag; transmitting, by the network captured network traffic distribution device, the data packet to the at least one intervening network captured traffic distribution device positioned between the network captured traffic distribution device and the target destination; receiving, by the intervening network captured traffic distribution device, the transmitted data packet; determining, by the intervening network captured traffic distribution device, the target destination of the received data packet based on the VLAN tag inserted into the received data packet; and transmitting, by the intervening network captured traffic distribution device, the received data packet toward the target destination.