Secure personal server system and method
View Patent ↗A provider computer announces content to the provider computer and establishes a secure connection to a VPN server. Requests for the content are received in one protocol (HTTPS) from the consumer computer and forwarded to the VPN server in a less secure protocol (HTTP) by a protocol conversion proxy, which then forwards the request to the provider computer. A public URL and secure URL may be associated with the same content. The public URL is announced to a consumer computer. A public server receives the public URL and returns the secure URL, which consumer computer uses to establish a secure connection to the provider computer. Upon the secure URL being compromised, a new secure URL is associated with the public URL. The source IP addresses of requests for the public and secure URLs may be compared to determine whether the secure URL is compromised.
1. A method for providing access to content on a first computer, the method comprising:
receiving, by a server system, a request from a first computer to establish an encrypted connection comprising a virtual private network (VPN) tunnel according to a VPN protocol;
establishing, by the server system, the VPN tunnel with the first computer;
establishing, by the server system, the first connection inside the VPN tunnel such that the server system is enabled to transmit to the first computer over the first connection in a reverse direction within the VPN tunnel, the first connection using a first type of communication protocol, the first type of protocol being less secure than the VPN protocol;
receiving, by the server system, a request from a second computer to establish a second connection to the server system, the second connection using a second type of communication protocol, the second type of protocol being more secure than the first type of protocol;
establishing, by the server system, the second connection to the second computer outside of any encrypted transport-level tunnel;
receiving, by the server system, from the second computer a first request for the content on the first computer, the first request being transmitted over the second connection according to the second type of communication protocol;
decrypting, by the server system, data from the first request to obtain decrypted data using an encryption key available to the server system; and
generating, by the server system, a second request containing the decrypted data according to the first type of communication protocol;
transmitting, by the server system, the second request to the first computer over the first connection within the VPN tunnel according to the first type of communication protocol;
receiving, by the server system, a first response from the first computer, the first response being received according to the first type of communication protocol over the first connection inside the VPN tunnel;
converting, by the server system, the first response to a second response, the second response including translated data that is translated from data in the first response by encrypting the data in the first response using the encryption key; and
transmitting, by the server system, the second response to the second computer according to the second type of communication protocol.
2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising transmitting the second request to the first computer only in response to determining that a number of simultaneous connections to the first computer are less than a threshold.
3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
reporting, by the server system, availability of the content on the first computer to a routing module;
receiving, by the routing module, reports of availability of content on a plurality of different computers from a plurality of intermediary servers;
receiving, by the routing module, the request for the content on the first computer from the second computer; and
routing, by the routing module, the request for the content on the first computer to the server system.
4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the server system and routing module are in the same local network.
5. A method for providing access to content on a personal computer, the method comprising:
receiving, by a server system from the personal computer, a posting message, the posting message including a posting uniform resource locator (URL) and referencing content on the personal computer;
receiving, by the server system, a request message from a requesting computer, the request message including the posting URL and having hypertext transport protocol secure (HTTPS) request formatting;
establishing, by the server system, a virtual private network (VPN) tunnel to the personal computer;
decrypting, by the server system, data from the request message using an encryption key to obtain the posting URL;
generating a translated response including the posting URL and having hypertext transport protocol (HTTP) request formatting; and
transmitting, by the server system, the translated message to the personal computer according to HTTP protocol within the VPN tunnel;
receiving, by the server system, a response to the translated message from the personal computer, the response being received according to HTTP protocol through the VPN tunnel and including the content;
encrypting, by the server system, the content using the encryption key to obtain a translated response; and
transmitting, by the server system, the translated response to the requesting computer according to HTTPS protocol.
6. The method of claim 5 , further comprising:
reporting, by the server system, the posting URL to a routing module;
receiving, by the routing module from a plurality of intermediary servers, other URLs referencing content on a plurality of other computers;
receiving, by the routing module, the request message; and
routing, by the routing module, the request message to the server system.
7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the server system and routing module are in the same local network.
8. A computer-readable medium comprising a non-transitory storage device and storing executable code effective instruct one or more processors to:
receive an instruction to make content available to a recipient computer system;
in response to the instruction to make the content available to a recipient computer system, transmit an invitation to access the content to the recipient computer system;
establish an encrypted virtual private network (VPN) connection to an intermediary server system;
receive one or more requests for the content; and
for each request of the one or more requests—
only if the each request is both of received from the intermediary server and through the encrypted VPN connection, transmitting the content to the intermediary server over the encrypted VPN connection; and
if the each request is not both of received from the intermediary server and through the encrypted VPN connection, refraining from transmitting the content to the intermediary server over the encrypted VPN connection;
wherein the executable code is further effective to instruct the one or more processors to transmit the invitation to access the content to the recipient computer system in bypass of the intermediary server.
9. The computer-readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the executable code includes instruction for instructing the one or more processors to transmit the invitation to access the content to the recipient computer system in at least one of a text message, email, message, and posting to a web site.
10. The computer-readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the invitation to access the content includes a domain name referencing a computer hosting the processor.