Incremental application of resources to network traffic flows based on heuristics and business policies

• US 9,473,456 B2
• Filed: 07/16/2015
• Issued: 10/18/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 04/11/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Level 3 Communications LLC (Lumen Technologies, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Level 3 Communications LLC (Lumen Technologies, Inc.)
• Inventors: Caputo, Pete Joseph II, Sella, William Thomas
• Primary Examiner(s): Chu, Wutchung
• Application Number:
  US14/800,933
• Publication Number:
  US 20150358287A1
• Time in Patent Office: 460 Days
• Field of Search: 370/235, 370/252, 370/241, 370/230, 370/392, 709223-225
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0893 Assignment of logical groups to network elements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0894 Policy-based network configuration management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0895 Configuration of virtualised networks or elements, e.g. virtualised network function or OpenFlow elements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/026 using flow identification
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/028 by filtering
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/18 Protocol analysers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/22 Alternate routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/243 using M+N parallel active paths
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/30 Routing of multiclass traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/10 Flow control; Congestion control
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/20 Traffic policing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/24 Traffic characterised by specific attributes, e.g. priority or QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2441 relying on flow classification, e.g. using integrated services [IntServ]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0236 Filtering by address, protocol, port number or service, e.g. IP-address or URL
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1416 Event detection, e.g. attack signature detection
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1425 Traffic logging, e.g. anomaly detection
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/22 Parsing or analysis of headers

Abstract

Disclosed herein are system, method, and computer program product embodiments for increasingly applying network resources to traffic flows based on heuristics and policy conditions. A network determines that a traffic flow satisfies a first condition and transmits a first portion of the traffic flow to a network service. A network service then inspects the first portion of the traffic flow at a first level of detail and determines that the traffic flow satisfies a second condition. The network can then transmit a second portion of the traffic flow to the network service based on the determining the traffic flow satisfies the second condition. The network service can inspect the second portion of the traffic flow at a second level of detail, wherein the inspecting at the second level of detail requires a different amount of computing resources than the inspecting at the first level of detail.

Claims

1. A method for operating a network service provider, comprising:

receiving a first portion of a traffic flow from a router in a plurality of routers in a network, wherein the traffic flow satisfies a first condition;

inspecting the first portion of the traffic flow at a first level of detail;

determining, based on the inspecting, that the traffic flow satisfies a second condition;

when the traffic flow is determined to satisfy the second condition;

receiving a second portion of the traffic flow, wherein the second portion of the traffic flow comprises a larger amount of information than the first portion of the traffic flow; and

inspecting the second portion of the traffic flow at a second level of detail, wherein the inspecting at the second level of detail requires a different amount of computing resources than the inspecting at the first level of detail,

wherein the inspecting the first portion of the traffic flow at a first level of detail comprises inspecting the header information of the packets belonging to the traffic flow, and the inspecting the second portion of the traffic flow at a second level of detail comprises inspecting the header and payload information of the packets describing the traffic flow.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the first condition is determined by a policy associated with the traffic flow, and wherein the association between the traffic flow and the policy is based on at least one of a network client, a pair of source and destination addresses, a pair of source and destination ports, a protocol, and an application program describing the flow.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the second condition is determined by a policy associated with the traffic flow, and wherein the association between the traffic flow and the policy is based on at least one of a network client, a pair of source and destination addresses, a pair of source and destination ports, a protocol, and an application program describing the flow.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the first condition determined by the policy comprises a parameter associated with the traffic flow and a level of security desired for the traffic flow.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining whether a packet from the traffic flow poses a security risk; and

when the packet is determined to pose a security risk, blocking the packet.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising:

in response to determining that the packet poses a security risk, sending out an alert message.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the inspecting the second portion of the traffic flow is performed to provide one of a firewall service, an anti-virus service, and an anti-spam service.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the second portion of the traffic flow comprises samples of packet headers of the traffic flow.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the second condition comprises one of a heuristic, a policy associated with the traffic flow, or an event of interest.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein inspecting the second portion of the traffic flow at a second level of detail comprises performing an intrusion detection analysis.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a third portion of the traffic flow based on the inspecting the traffic flow at the second level of detail; and

inspecting the third portion of the traffic flow at a third level of detail.

12. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one computing device, causes the at least one computing device to perform a method for operating a network service provider, the method comprising:

receiving a first portion of a traffic flow in a network, wherein the traffic flow satisfies a first condition;

inspecting the first portion of the traffic flow at a first level of detail;

determining, based on the inspecting, that the traffic flow satisfies a second condition;

in response to determining that the traffic flow satisfies the second condition, sending a message to a controller indicating satisfying the second condition, wherein the controller is configured to instruct one or more routers to transmit a second portion of the traffic flow to the network service provider based on the determining the traffic flow satisfies the second condition;

subsequent to sending the message, receiving the second portion of the traffic flow, wherein the second portion of the traffic flow comprises a larger amount of information than the first portion of the traffic flow; and

in response to receiving the second portion of the traffic flow, inspecting the second portion of the traffic flow at a second level of detail, wherein the inspecting at the second level of detail requires a different amount of computing resources than the inspecting at the first level of detail,

wherein the inspecting the first portion of the traffic flow at a first level of detail comprises inspecting the header information of the packets belonging to the traffic flow, and inspecting the second portion of the traffic flow at a second level of detail comprises inspecting the header and payload information of the packets describing the traffic flow.

13. The computer-readable medium of claim 12, wherein the first condition is determined by a policy associated with the traffic flow, and wherein the association between the traffic flow and the policy is based on at least one of a network client, a pair of source and destination addresses, a pair of source and destination ports, a protocol, and an application program describing the flow.

14. The computer-readable medium of claim 12, wherein the second condition is determined by a policy associated with the traffic flow, and wherein the association between the traffic flow and the policy is based on at least one of a network client, a pair of source and destination addresses, a pair of source and destination ports, a protocol, and an application program describing the flow.

15. The computer-readable medium of claim 12, wherein the inspecting the second portion of the traffic flow is performed to provide one of a firewall service, an anti-virus service, and an anti-spam service.

16. The computer-readable medium of claim 12, the method further comprising:

determining whether a packet from the traffic flow poses a security risk; and

when the packet is determined to pose a security risk, blocking the packet.

17. The computer-readable medium of claim 12, the method further comprising:

receiving a third portion of the traffic flow based on the inspecting the traffic flow at the second level of detail; and

inspecting the third portion of the traffic flow at a third level of detail.