Patent ID: 7522530

Claim:
A method for classifying connections detected between senders and receivers belonging to a communication network, said senders and receivers using communication protocols, each communication protocol designated by a user protocol name, said method being performed and operated by means of a computing system, the method comprising: recognizing determinant information on the protocol designated by said name, from among information conveyed in a detected connection, by a protocol self-identifier mechanism associated with each implicit and explicit used protocol name and devised to recognize said determinant information; establishing a non-empty or empty list of potentially used protocol names referred to as a list of son protocol names, with said list of son protocol names being associated with one of each said used protocol names, the protocol name so associated with the list of son protocol names being referred to as father protocol name; and for each detected connection, by a computing kernel operated by said computing system; constructing and thus associating to each detected connection a first data structure devised so as to contain an ordered sequence of used protocol names which is initialized with a so-called base protocol name, said first data structure being devised by searching, throughout said list of son protocol names associated with the last name of said ordered sequence, discriminating between implicit and explicit son protocol name, for a son protocol name for which said associated self-identifier mechanism recognizes determinant information from among said conveyed information and then appending to the end of said ordered sequence said son protocol name when it is found and repeating the search again otherwise, so long as it is possible to find in said list of son protocol names which is associated with the last name of said ordered sequence, a son protocol name for which said associated self-identifier mechanism recognizes determinant information from among said conveyed information; and declaring said detected connection as being classified when it is no longer possible to find, in said list of son protocol names associated with the last name of said ordered sequence, a son protocol name for which said associated self-identifier mechanism recognizes determinant information from among said conveyed information.