Customer premise equipment device-specific access-limiting for a cable modem and a customer premise equipment device

A method of initializing, provisioning, and managing a cable modem and a customer premise equipment device, the customer premise equipment device being connected to the cable modem, the cable modem being connected to a cable modem termination system, the cable modem termination system being connected to a provider network, the method including initializing the cable modem connection to the cable modem termination system, providing the cable modem with a network address, and the cable modem receiving a cable modem configuration file from a network server, wherein the configuration file contains service provisioning information, the cable modem passing certain contents of the configuration file to the cable modem termination system, and the cable modem termination system passing certain identifiers back to the cable modem, the configuration file being an access-limiting configuration file in a case where the cable modem has yet to be provisioned, the access-limiting configuration file restricting network access from the cable modem until the cable modem is provisioned, the method further comprising:

• prior to receiving the configuration file, the cable modem providing an equipment identification message, the equipment identification message containing a description of the customer premise equipment device;
• and
• wherein the configuration file received from the network server, in the case where the cable modem has yet to be provisioned, is a particular access-limiting configuration file that is selected from a group of access-limiting configuration files, the selection of the particular access-limiting configuration file being based on the description of the customer premise equipment device.