Patent ID: 8031872

Claim:
A base station comprising: a storage medium to store an authentication key context, including an uplink packet number and a downlink packet number that respectively correspond to a media access control (MAC) message received by the base station from a mobile subscriber station and a downlink MAC message transmitted to the mobile subscriber station from the base station, for an authentication key cached in the storage medium and associated with authenticating the mobile subscriber station to be serviced in a coverage area of an access network, the mobile subscriber station to be serviced while the authentication key remains cached in the storage medium for an established lifetime of a pairwise master key from which the authentication key is derived; and an authentication module coupled to the storage medium and configured to purge the authentication key and the authentication key context from the storage medium, prior to expiration of the established lifetime of the pairwise master key, based at least in part on learning of a determination that the mobile subscriber station failed to respond to a plurality of pages, wherein a predefined period of time elapses between consecutive pages of the plurality of pages, and the plurality of pages is greater than a predetermined threshold number of pages.