approach described below in accordance with one embodiment of the invention claimed in the appurtenant claims employs commercial off the shelf cots equipment and software to construct a segregated multi domain or multi trust realm network the cots equipment and firmware are employed in ways and in quantities not envisioned by their manufacturers e g multiple routers are used per network whereas only a single router or a primary router and a backup router such as would typically be used in a single network and the cots equipment and software are employed in a fashion not envisioned by their designers features built into the cots equipment and software are used in concert with one device or program complimenting a next device or program in a series the use of both physically separate networks and the use of encryption are eschewed in the illustrated embodiment due to their high demand for resources and in the case of encryption poor performance relative to systems not employing encryption referring next to fig3 a block diagram showing an exemplary architecture for a network having multiple domains or trust realms blue yellow red and communicating over a single common channel 318 is illustrated at either end of the single common channel 318 one of a pair of gigabit ethernet gbe switches 300 302 are employed as will be appreciated by one of ordinary skill in this art the use of two gbe switches is a minimum meaning that more than two gbe switches could be used consistent with the teachings of the present embodiment an additional gbe switch is shown in an effort to illustrate additional scalability this aspect is further discussed below coupled to each of the gbe switches 300 302 is a.