Method and apparatus for fragmenting and reassembling internet key exchange data packets

A network node that communicates with other network nodes according to the Internet Key Exchange (IKE) protocol comprising:

• a User Datagram Protocol (UDP) stack that is capable of generating UDP data packets for transmission over a network;
• an IKE protocol stack that generates IKE data packets that are subsequently processed by the UDP protocol stack;
• and
• a fragmenter module that intercepts IKE data packets prior to being processed by to the UDP protocol stack and splits the IKE data packets into a plurality of smaller data packets that may be subsequently formatted by the UDP protocol stack.

A method for fragmenting a data packet comprising the steps of:

• generating an IKE data packet;
• intercepting the IKE data packet before it is passed to a subsequent network protocol stack;
• determining a maximum size for fragments of an IKE data packet;
• dividing the IKE data packet into at least two smaller packets;
• and
• prepending a header to each smaller packet, wherein each header for each smaller packet includes an identifier that associates the smaller packet with its corresponding IKE data packet.

A system for transmitting Internet Key Exchange (IKE) protocol data packets across a network comprising:

• means for generating an IKE packet;
• means for detecting whether the IKE packet was successfully received at the intended receiver node;
• and
• means for fragmenting the IKE packets into smaller packets when the IKE packet was not successfully received at the receiver node, wherein each of the smaller packets includes information that permits a receiver node to identify the IKE packet associated with each smaller packet and the position of each smaller packet within the IKE packet.