Patent ID: 8001381

Claim:
A method for mutual authentication of a first node and a second node in a wireless communication network, the method comprising: processing at the first node a beacon message received from the second node, wherein the beacon message comprises a first nonce value; transmitting from the first node to the second node an association request message comprising a certificate of the first node, a first signed block of authentication data, a second nonce value, and a third nonce value, whereby the second node can verify a signature of the certificate of the first node and verify a signature of the first signed block of authentication data; processing at the first node an association reply message received from the second node, wherein the association reply message comprises a certificate of the second node, a second signed block of authentication data, a fourth nonce value, and a first random keying data including a pairwise master key of the second node encrypted using a public key of the first node, whereby the first node verifies a signature of the certificate of the second node and verifies a signature of the second signed block of authentication data; and generating at the first node a pairwise transient key from the pairwise master key using the third nonce value and the fourth nonce value.