Patent ID: 8811152

Claim:
A method of providing service to a residential gateway device, the method comprising: detecting, at a first residential gateway device, a service disruption associated with a first connection between an access node of a service provider and the first residential gateway device, wherein the access node is configured to provide a service to a plurality of residential gateway devices including the first residential gateway device, a second residential gateway device, and a third residential gateway device; selecting the second residential gateway device based on a bandwidth capacity of a second connection between the first residential gateway device and the second residential gateway device and based on a policy associated with the third residential gateway device, the policy restricting the third residential gateway device from providing a communication path from any other residential gateway device of the plurality of residential gateway devices to the access node; authenticating the second connection using a first credential stored at the first residential gateway device and a second credential stored at the second residential gateway device; and in response to the detected service disruption, establishing the second connection between the first residential gateway device and the second residential gateway device.