International Business Machines Corporation

Marco A Cabrera

Dwip N Banerjee

Eduardo Reyes

Tommy Lucas McLane

A method includes receiving a request from a network source to create a logical socket on a logical port. The method includes accessing a structure that indicates a plurality of logical socket allocation policies to select a first of the plurality of socket allocation policies that corresponds to the logical port. Each of the plurality of logical socket allocation policies governs logical socket allocation for one or more ports, wherein logical allocation policies govern at least one of 1) the number of logical sockets that are allocated to the one or more logical ports, 2) a maximum number of logical sockets shared between a grouping of two or more logical ports, and 3) a maximum number of logical sockets. The method includes determining if the first logical socket allocation policy allows for allocation of the logical socket for the network source to communicate. The method includes allocating a logical socket.

Managing logical sockets

Network attacks, such as a denial of service (DoS) attack, attempt to exhaust server resources and can cause a network to be unavailable for significant periods of time. Although a firewall can be utilized to defend a system from network attacks, the number of incoming connections created can be controlled to defend the system against network attacks. An operating system creates connections, known as sockets, on one or more logical ports. Incoming connections are connections whose creation requests originate from a source outside the operating system. Functionality to control socket creation can be implemented within the operating system, thus allowing a system to be placed directly on a network without a firewall. Implementing defense against network attacks within an operating system reduces the additional cost of having firewall products, and can lead to more efficient network configurations.

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Austin, TX, United States of America

Marco A Cabrera