Patent ID: 8566589

Claim:
A method of identifying a web server on a network, comprising: identifying an initial request by a client to an intended web server; transmitting, to the intended web server, a fingerprint request in response to identifying the initial request, wherein the fingerprint request elicits a fingerprint response that indicates one or more fingerprint characteristics; determining a fingerprint for the intended web server using the one or more fingerprint characteristics, wherein the fingerprint is determined based on at least one of one or more lexical characteristics, one or more syntactic characteristics, and one or more semantic characteristics associated with the fingerprint response; detecting a subsequent request by the client to the intended web server; receiving a response to the subsequent request from a responding web server; and verifying that the responding web server is the intended web server using the fingerprint, wherein verifying comprises: analyzing the one or more fingerprint characteristics of the response to determine at least one fingerprint of the responding web server, determining a first fingerprint of the responding web server based on a first portion of the one or more fingerprint characteristics, and determining a second fingerprint of the responding web server based on a second portion of the one or more fingerprint characteristics in the event the first fingerprint of the responding web server does not match the fingerprint of the intended web server.