Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Daniel W Roth

Dhananjay Madhusudan Mahajan

Scott Christopher Seely

Travis Muhlestein

Babak G Jahromi

John F Noss

Luis Felipe Cabrera

Erik B Christensen

David Wortendyke

David Edwin Levin

George Prentice Copeland

The present invention extends to methods, systems, and computer program products for securely inspecting electronic messages. A computer system receives a control message that is passed through one or more receiving path components, positioned in a message receiving path, to a security component. The security component authenticates the received control message and passes the received control message to an inspection control component. The inspection control component activates message inspection in accordance with instructions contained in the received control message. When message inspection is activated, the computer system passes accessed messages to corresponding inspection components positioned in message paths (either receiving or sending) of the accessed message. The inspection component generates an inspection report (e.g., including a portion of contents of the accessed message) in accordance with instructions contained in a previously authenticated control message.

Securely inspecting electronic messages

Mechanisms in which upon receiving a message, the message is passed through one or more receiving path components that are positioned in the receiving path of the message prior to being passed to a dispatching component. One or more of the receiving path components may modify the message to include information that may be helpful to the dispatching component in order to perform the dispatch. The dispatching component receives modified message, and uses information from the modified message (including potentially the modification itself) to perform the dispatch. Since the message is modified to include additional information helpful to the dispatching component, the dispatching component may be more flexible in identifying the processing that should occur with the message. Accordingly, specialized and flexible processing may be enabled that is ideally suited for the message.

Adaptive dispatch of received messages to code using inter-positioned message modification

The present invention extends to methods, systems, and computer program products for integrating messaging diagnostics into a messaging pipeline. A messaging pipeline receives a control message and passes the control message through one or more pipeline components (potentially a security component) positioned in the messaging pipeline. The control message is passed to a diagnostic control component positioned in the messaging pipeline subsequent to passing the received control message through one or more pipeline components. The diagnostic control component activates message diagnostics at diagnostic components positioned within one or more messaging pipelines in accordance with instructions contained in the control message. When message diagnostics are activated, messaging pipelines pass accessed messages to diagnostic components positioned in the messaging pipeline. The diagnostic components perform diagnostic operations based on the contents of the accessed message in accordance with instructions contained in the previously processed (and potentially authenticated) control message.

Integrating electronic messaging diagnostics into a messaging pipeline

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Bellevue, WA, United States of America

Daniel W Roth