I was looking at the description of this patent (thanks to JYA for providing easy access to this article...), and I can't believe Sun got a patent for this. Tunneling encrypted IP sessions over regular IP by using a gateway router is hardly a novel idea and is immediately obvious to anyone who is knowledgable in networking and crypto. Aren't there already products out there (hardware and software) that implement this sort of thing? I seem to remember Cisco producing a router and MorningStar producing software that did this. I also seem to remember the concept being discussed on this very list several years back (can't check the archives from work though...) I believe there is even a name for it: VPN (Virtual Private Networks) John Gilmore is currently putting together a project to do much the same thing in software... Did I miss something innovative in this patent, or is this another example of clueless patent examiners granting patents for things that don't deserve patent protection? andrew