Patent ID: 8175229

Claim:
A system for supporting a messaging service, comprising: a first translation gateway for use between (a) a customer data network that is accessed, by those authorized by a customer of the messaging service, to receive a message via a client process, and (b) a hostile data network, the first translation gateway having translation functionality that is applied to a plurality of inbound messages, arriving via the hostile network, in a manner that is transparent to recipients of said inbound messages who experience the inbound messages via a plurality of client processes running in the customer data network, wherein the first translation gateway is to forward the inbound messages from the hostile data network to the recipients over the customer data network, and wherein the first translation gateway is a node of the customer data network and the hostile data network; and a second translation gateway for use between (a) the hostile data network and (b) a service provider network of a provider of said messaging service, wherein said service provider network implements an interface to a telephony network from which the inbound messages originate, the second translation gateway to forward the inbound messages to the first translation gateway through the hostile network in a manner that precludes unauthorized access to the content of the inbound messages, wherein the first translation gateway and the second translation gateway are nodes of a virtual private network (VPN) so that the inbound messages can be passed between the first and second translation gateways through a VPN tunnel.