Leaking routes among routing engines in a highly scalable router

A system for leaking routes among requesting and exporting routers in a communication network, the system comprising:

• one or more routers;
• a route distribution service for receiving routing information from one or more exporting routers, the received routing information including:
• one or more shared routes;
• and
• route importing criteria for each route, the route importing criteria including a policy received from at least one of the exporting routers that restricts specific requesting routers from receiving exported shared routes and permits specific requesting routers to receive the exported shared routes;
• and
• a database for storing the received routing information, the database being accessible by more than one requesting router;
• wherein the route distribution service receives from one or more requesting routers a request for one or more shared routes, determines whether the request for the one or more shared routes matches the route importing criteria, provides, only upon receipt of the request, one or more shared routes to the one or more requesting routers that are not restricted from receiving exported shared routes according to the policy received from the at least one exporting router, and provides, only upon receipt of the request, the one or more shared routes to the one or more requesting routers that are permitted to receive the exported shared routes according to the policy received from the at least one exporting router.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing a computer program which when executed by a processing unit performs a method for leaking routes among routers in a communication network, the method comprising:

• receiving routing information from one or more exporting routers, the received routing information including:
• one or more routes to be shared;
• and
• route importing criteria for each route, the route importing criteria including a policy received from at least one of the exporting routers that restricts specific requesting routers from receiving exported shared routes and permits specific requesting routers to receive the exported shared routes;
• storing the received routing information in a database, the database being accessible by more than one requesting router;
• receiving from one or more requesting routers a request for one or more shared routes;
• determining, by a processor, whether the request for the one or more shared routes matches the route importing criteria;
• providing, only upon receipt of the request, one or more shared routes to one or more requesting routers that are not restricted from receiving exported shared routes according to the policy received from the at least one exporting router;
• and
• providing, only upon receipt of the request, the one or more shared routes to the one or more requesting routers that are permitted to receive the exported shared routes according to the policy received from the at least one exporting router.