Apparatus and method for accelerating intrusion detection and prevention systems using pre-filtering

Abstract

An accelerated network intrusion detection and prevention system includes, in part, first, second and third processing stages. The first processing stage receives incoming packets and generates, in response, first and second processed data streams using a first set of rules. The first processing stage optionally detects whether the received packets are suspected of attacking the network and places the received data packets in the first processed data stream. The second processing stage receives the first processed data stream and generates, in response, a third processed data stream using a second set of rules. The second processing stage optionally classifies the first processed data stream, that is suspected of launching a network attack, as either attacks or benign network traffic. A third processing stage receives and processes the second and third processed data streams.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.