Patent ID: 8861495

Claim:
A method for protecting data transmitted from a transmitting wireless station to at least one receiving wireless station in a wireless communication system using Multi-User Multiple Input Multiple Output (MU-MIMO) technology, comprising: (a) transmitting a transmission request frame from the transmitting wireless station to each of the at least one receiving wireless station; and (b) receiving a transmission approval frame from each of the at least one receiving wireless station as a response to the transmission request frame, wherein the transmission request frame is a Request To Send (RTS) frame having a same format as an IEEE 802.11a RTS frame or an IEEE 802.11n RTS frame, and includes a Very High Throughput (VHT) data marker for protecting VHT traffic, the transmission approval frame is a Clear to Send (CTS) frame, the VHT data marker includes a bit that is a reserved bit in an IEEE 802.11a RTS frame or an IEEE 802.11n RTS frame, and the RTS frame includes a duration value corresponding to a sum of a transmission time of the CTS frame, a transmission time of a next data frame, and a response time for the next data frame.