Patent ID: 7983262

Claim:
A switch comprising: a plurality of ports; a memory configured to store a bridge table, the bridge table including an entry that associates an Internet Protocol (IP) multicast destination address and an IP source address with a port indicator, the port indicator identifying one or more of the plurality of ports; and a controller configured to, in response to the switch receiving an Ethernet packet comprising an IP multicast packet, generate a key based on an IP multicast destination address and an IP source address associated with the Ethernet packet; perform a lookup on the bridge table using the key; and flood the Ethernet packet to the one or more ports identified by the port indicator in response to confirming based on the key that the entry in the bridge table is an IP multicast entry, and determining, if the entry is confirmed as an IP multicast entry, that the IP multicast destination address and the IP source address of the entry matches the IP multicast destination address and the IP source address of the Ethernet packet.