Abstract: Systems and methods of securing access to a network are described. Access to the network is secured using multifactor authentication, biometrics, strong encryption, and a variety of wireless networking standards. Biometrics include fingerprints, facial recognition, retinal scan, voice recognition and biometrics can are used in combination with other authentication factors to create a multi-factor authentication scheme for highly secure network access. Requests that require access to secured network resources may be intercepted and a captive portal page returned to challenge a user. Biometric information returned in response to the portal page is used to authenticate the user and determine access rights to the network.

Abstract: A method for Internet protocol (IP) address discovery in a rapidly changing network environment is presented. A server and a client use an adaptive discovery polling process to determine an optimum heartbeat interval that minimizes network traffic and allows the server to monitor the client's source address. The client and server exchange discovery poll messages and heartbeat messages at varying time intervals in order to identify a computer network's timeout period or a network address translator's message block timeout period. Once the timeout period is identified, the client sends heartbeat messages to the server at an “optimum heartbeat interval” that is less than the identified timeout period in order to maintain the network connection. As a result, the server is able to send messages to the client without delay.