Methods and systems for establishing secure TCP/IP communications for individual network connections include the steps of intercepting a conventional TCP SYN packet prior to transmission from a source node to a destination node, embedding unique identifiers into standard fields of the packet header, wherein the unique identifiers are associated with the specific connection attempt and wherein the unique identifiers identify the user account and/or the computer hardware initiating the communication attempt, then forwarding the modified TCP SYN packet to the destination node and intercepting the modified TCP SYN packet prior to arrival, determining whether secure communications are required based on the unique identifiers extracted from the packet headers, based on other TCP/IP information, and based on predefined rules associated with the same. If secure communications are required, such requirement is communicated within either an RST or a SYN-ACK back to the source node.