Patent ID: 8879420

Claim:
A docking station, comprising: a docking port configured to physically dock with a mobile device, wherein the docking port includes an input/output port, wherein multiple different types of applications are installed at the mobile device and wherein each one of the multiple different types of applications implements a certain function when executed at the mobile device; a communication interface configured to send and receive traffic via a wired network; and a processing unit configured to: set-up multiple Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) via the wired network and one or more other networks, assign at least one network address from multiple network addresses to each one of the multiple VPNs, and configure, via the input/output port, the mobile device to send and/or receive traffic via selected ones of the multiple VPNs, wherein, when configuring the mobile device via the input/output port, the processing unit is further configured to: determine if the mobile device has been docked in the docking port, determine an identity of the mobile device if it has been docked in the docking port, and set-up multiple network interfaces on the docked mobile device based on the identity of the docked mobile device, wherein, when setting-up the multiple network interfaces, the processing unit is further configured to: match, in a data structure stored at the docking station, the determined identity of the docked mobile device to data in multiple device identifier fields of the data structure to retrieve the multiple network addresses, and assign a different one of the retrieved multiple network addresses to each of the multiple network interfaces, wherein the processing unit is further configured to: map, in the data structure, a first one of the multiple different types of applications to a first one of the multiple network addresses, and map, in the data structure, a second one of the multiple different types of applications to a second one of the multiple network addresses.