Patent ID: 7602780

Claim:
A method of identifying content in a packet, the method comprising: obtaining a data sample from the packet, the data sample being in a predetermined window at an initial offset point in the packet; for each offset point, performing a first stage of processing on the data sample to obtain a first stage result, the first stage result identifying that the data sample corresponds to a potentially relevant reference string retrieved from memory; based on the first stage result, performing a second stage of processing on the data sample to obtain a second stage result, the second stage result identifying that the data sample corresponds to the potentially relevant reference string; based on the second stage result, performing a third stage of processing on the data sample to obtain a third stage result, the third stage of processing on the data sample comprising performing a comparison between the potentially relevant reference string identified in the second stage and the actual content of the packet associated with a payload location, the first, second, and third stage of processing being performed by a processor; and based on the third stage result, identifying a predefined action associated with the potentially relevant reference string corresponding to the data sample.