Multicasting over public network

Stky10

Just writing a technical proposal in work, and I'm thinking that
Multicasting could save a lot of bother. I'm just wondering though
if multicasting can be used over a public network (ie the internet)
and would security be an issue (ie only want a specific number
of hosts to receive the data, and dont want any non-authorised
users).

Any mention I've heard of multicasting before has always been
for internal networks where security wouldnt be that much of
an issue.

po0k

From my limited experience of it, each AS network is given a block of Class-D address space for multicast.
That should/may help with the tied down part.

Afaik, there are higher-level mthods for securing access, but nothing like a VPN afaik.

BobTheBeat

I wouldn't say it would be a problem in a public (non-secured) network. Cisco in fact have an implementation of the routing protocol OSPF called MOSPF (Multicast Open Shortest Path First) which makes each router understand the link states in the network.