Patent ID: 8855071

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving, with a downstream mobile gateway of a mobile network, a packet destined for one of a plurality of subscriber devices in the mobile network, wherein the packet is received from an upstream mobile gateway and includes a destination address for the one of the plurality of subscribers and a tunnel endpoint identifier (TEID) that identifies a tunnel between the downstream mobile gateway and the upstream mobile gateway; determining, with the downstream mobile gateway, whether the TEID is associated with one of a plurality of subscriber records maintained by the downstream mobile gateway that store session data for current sessions associated with the plurality of subscriber devices to communicate with the mobile network; in response to determining that the TEID is not associated with one of the plurality of subscriber records, generating, with the downstream mobile gateway, a message that includes both the TEID and the destination address and indicates that the downstream mobile gateway has determined that the TEID is not associated with one of the subscriber records for the current sessions; and sending, with the downstream mobile gateway, the message to the upstream mobile gateway.