Patent ID: 7839846

Claim:
A method of identifying messages, which are associated with a particular communications session, in a stream of messages, which are captured from an interface within a network and comprise user data and network signalling data, the network including a fixed station in wireless communications with a plurality of mobile stations, said particular communications session being associated with one of said mobile stations and said stream of messages including messages for a plurality of communications sessions, the method comprising: inputting a portion of said stream of messages; reading network signalling data from said messages of said inputted stream, said signalling data including a plurality of network signalling parameters; assigning a first session identifier to at least one message having a first one of said network signalling parameters, said at least one message being one of said messages of said inputted stream; assigning a second session identifier to at least one message having a second one of said network signalling parameters, said at least one message being one of said messages of said inputted stream; identifying a message having both said first and said second signalling parameters; using said identified message having both said first and second signalling parameters to link said at least one message having said first session identifier and said at least one message having said second identifier to identify messages of said particular communications session; and identifying said linked messages of said particular communications session by allocating a common identifier to said linked messages.