Patent ID: 8700775

Claim:
A method for routing a communication to a platform service, the method comprising: receiving a first message and a second message in a first communication; sending an acknowledgement message to a source of the first communication in reply to the first message; analyzing payload data contained in the second message to identify a communication type, wherein the communication type is specific to one of a plurality of platform service types available for routing, the available plurality of platform service types including a virtual private network platform service and an extranet platform service; sending a first message and a second message in a second communication to a corresponding platform service of the platform service type specific to the communication type indicated by the payload data, wherein the second message in the second communication includes the payload data contained in the second message of the first communication; receiving an acknowledgement of the first message from the corresponding platform service; receiving a reply responsive to the second message in the second communication from the corresponding platform service; and relaying the reply from the corresponding platform service to the source of the first communication.