Patent ID: 7983153

Claim:
An edge device in a first routing domain, comprising: a first network interface configured to communicate with a second routing domain via a data link; a second network interface configured to receive a data packet containing a destination address that is reachable via the second routing domain and an indication that the data packet is a protected packet that was previously rerouted from another edge device in the first routing domain via a Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) Fast Reroute (FRR) backup path; and a processor configured to determine if communication with the second routing domain is still available via the data link, and if so, remove the indication that the data packet is a protected packet and forward the data packet over the first network interface to the second routing domain, and, if not, drop the data packet to prevent the data packet from being rerouted a second time in the first routing domain on another MPLS FRR backup path.