Applications, systems and methods for securely and remotely operating a
remote computer from a local computer over a network while providing seamless, firewall-compliant
connectivity. Secure and
remote operation includes authenticating at least one
remote computer for connection to at least one computer over the network and / or at least one local computer for connection to at least one
remote computer over the network; establishing a secure connection between the at least one local computer and the at least one remote computer over the network; and integrating a desktop of at least one remote computer on a display of at least one local computer. The connections may be made over a
public network, as well as through multiple firewalls without loss of functionality. A method of accessing and using at least one remote computer from a local computer over a
public network may include centrally authenticating, at a location having a public address, a first computer having a first, firewall protected
private address; creating a first firewall compliant connection between a publicly addressed connection
server and the first computer upon
authentication of the first computer; establishing a second firewall compliant connection between the publicly addressed connection
server and a second computer having a second firewall protected
private address; establishing a private-to-public-to-private communications tunnel, wherein the connection
server routes communications from the first computer through the first firewall compliant connection and the second firewall compliant connection to the second computer, and from the second computer through the second firewall compliant connection and the first firewall compliant connection to the first computer; and performing at least one further step selected from the group consisting of: integrating a file structure of accessible files accessed at the second or first computer, into a file structure contained at the first or second computer, respectively; at least one of integrating a desktop of the second computer on a display of the first computer and integrating a desktop of the first computer on a display of the second computer; and directly operating the second computer from the first computer or the first computer from the second computer, wherein the computer that is directly operated is selected from the group consisting of: home appliances,
video equipment,
audio equipment, printers, fax machines, office equipment, medical devices, vehicles, cameras, RFID equipment, laboratory equipment, manufacturing machinery, GPS equipment, and devices having one or more embedded microprocessors.