IP address hashing in advertisement gateway

• US 10,055,757 B1
• Filed: 01/21/2014
• Issued: 08/21/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 01/21/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: T-Mobile Innovations LLC (Deutsche Telekom AG)
• Original Assignee: Sprint Communications Company LP (Deutsche Telekom AG)
• Inventors: Burcham, Robert H., Delker, Jason R., Holmes, Geoffrey A., Rofail, Richard A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Munson, Patricia H
• Application Number:
  US14/160,196
• Time in Patent Office: 1,673 Days
• Field of Search: 705 14
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0251 Targeted advertisements

Abstract

A method of mediating advertisements through an advertisement gateway comprises receiving, at an advertisement gateway, a request message for an advertisement from an electronic device, hashing identifying information in the request message with a temporary identifier, creating a unique identification for the electronic device based on the hashing, replacing, by the advertisement gateway, the identifying information in the request message with the unique identification, sending, by the advertisement gateway, the request message comprising the unique identification to an advertisement provider server, receiving, at the advertisement gateway, an advertisement based on the request message comprising the unique identification, and sending, from the advertisement gateway, the advertisement to the electronic device.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of mediating advertisements through an advertisement gateway to protect the identity of an electronic device, the method comprising the following steps, all of which are performed by an advertisement gateway on a network:

receiving, at the advertisement gateway from an electronic device via the network, a request message for an advertisement provided by an advertisement provider server, wherein the request message comprises device identifying information of the electronic device;

hashing the device identifying information of the electronic device with a temporary identifier comprising a time period in which the request message is received;

creating a unique identification for the electronic device based on the hashing, wherein the unique identification remains constant for a given time period before changing;

replacing the device identifying information in the request message with the unique identification that shields the device identifying information of the electronic device from the advertisement provider server communicatively coupled to the advertisement gateway by hiding the device identifying information from the advertisement provider server and providing the unique identification only during the given time period prior to changing the unique identification;

in response to replacing the device identifying information with the unique identification that shields the advertisement provider server from the device identifying information of the electronic device, sending the request message comprising the unique identification to the advertisement provider server;

in response to sending the request message comprising the unique identification, receiving, at the advertisement gateway from the advertisement provider server, the advertisement based on the request message comprising the unique identification sent to the advertisement provider server;

based on the advertisement received from the advertisement provider server, detecting that the advertisement comprises an external content source reference that identifies a content provider server for the electronic device to directly;

in response to the detecting, embedding a parameter in the advertisement to correspond with the external content source reference identifying the content provider server;

rewriting the advertisement to use a proxy reference identifying the advertisement gateway instead of using the external content source reference that identifies the content provider server;

based on the embedding and the rewriting, creating a modified advertisement comprising the embedded parameter and the proxy reference identifying the advertisement gateway; and

sending, from the advertisement gateway, the modified advertisement to the electronic device.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

updating the temporary identifier to a new identifier;

receiving a second request message for a second advertisement from the electronic device, wherein the request message comprises the device identifying information for the electronic device;

hashing the device identifying information with the new identifier; and

creating a second unique identification for the electronic device based on the hashing;

replacing, by the advertisement gateway, the device identifying information in the second request message with the second unique identification;

sending, by the advertisement gateway, the second request message comprising the second unique identification to the advertisement provider server;

receiving, at the advertisement gateway, a second advertisement based on the second request message comprising the second unique identification; and

sending, from the advertisement gateway, the second advertisement to the electronic device.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the temporary identifier comprises a temporal identifier.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the device identifying information comprises at least one of an originating IP address, a mobile ID number, an application identification, or a pinsight ID.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein sending the advertisement to the electronic device is based on the unique identification.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the unique identification comprises a value in an IP address format, wherein the value is not an IP address of the electronic device.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

storing the device identifying information and the unique identification in a lookup table;

cross-referencing the unique identification with the device identifying information; and

addressing the advertisement received at the advertisement gateway with the device identifying information obtained based on the cross-referencing, wherein sending the advertisement to the electronic device comprises sending the advertisement to the electronic device using the device identifying information.

8. A computer-implemented method of mediating advertisements through an ad gateway to protect the identity of an electronic device, the method comprising the following steps, all of which are performed by an advertisement gateway on a network:

receiving, at the advertisement gateway from the mobile device via the network, a request message for content, wherein the request message comprises device identifying information for the electronic device;

hashing the device identifying information of the electronic device with a temporal identifier comprising a time period in which the request message is received;

creating a unique identifier for the electronic device based on the hashing, wherein the unique identifier comprises a number in an IP address format, wherein the number is not an IP address of the electronic device, and wherein the unique identifier remains constant for a given time period before changing;

replacing the device identifying information in the request message with the unique identifier that shields the device identifying information of the electronic device from a provider server communicatively coupled to the advertisement gateway by hiding the device identifying information from the provider server and providing the unique identifier only during the given time period prior to changing the unique identifier;

in response to replacing the device identifying information with the unique identification that shields the content server from the device identifying information of the electronic device, sending the request message comprising the unique identifier to the provider server;

in response to sending the request message, receiving, at the advertisement gateway, the content based on the request message comprising the unique identification;

based on the content received from the provider server, detecting that the content comprises an external content source reference that identifies a content provider server for the electronic device to contact directly;

in response to the detecting, embedding a parameter in the content to correspond with the external content source reference identifying the content provider server;

rewriting the content to use a proxy reference identifying the advertisement gateway instead of using the external content source reference that identifies the content provider server;

based on the embedding and the rewriting, creating a modified content comprising the embedded parameter and the proxy reference identifying the advertisement gateway; and

sending, from the advertisement gateway, the modified content to the electronic device.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the temporal identifier comprises a first time period.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

receiving, at the advertisement gateway, a second request message for a second content from the electronic device;

hashing the device identifying information with the temporal identifier;

creating the unique identifier for the electronic device based on the hashing;

replacing, by the advertisement gateway, the device identifying information in the request message with the unique identifier; and

sending, by the advertisement gateway, the second request message comprising the unique identifier to the provider server, wherein the provider server identifies the electronic device by the unique identifier.

11. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

receiving, at the advertisement gateway, a second request message for a second content from the electronic device after the first time period;

hashing the device identifying information with a second temporal identifier;

creating a second unique identifier for the electronic device based on the hashing;

replacing, by the advertisement gateway, the device identifying information in the request message with the second unique identifier; and

sending, by the advertisement gateway, the second request message comprising the second unique identifier to the content provider server.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein the content comprises an advertisement, and wherein the provider server comprises an advertisement provider server.

13. The method of claim 8, wherein the content comprises content associated with an advertisement, and wherein the provider server comprises the content provider server.

14. The method of claim 8, wherein the request message is generated by the electronic device in response to rendering an advertisement.

15. The method of claim 8, wherein the temporal identifier comprises at least one of:

a century, a year, a month, a day, a day of a week, a week of a month, a day of a year, an hour of a day, a minute of an hour, a minute of a day, or any combination thereof.

16. A system for protecting the identity of an electronic device by routing through an advertisement gateway comprising:

an advertisement gateway, comprising;

a processor,

a non-transitory memory, and

an ad proxy application stored in the non-transitory memory, that when executed on the processor, configures the processor to;

receive a request for an advertisement from an electronic device, wherein the request comprises an originating address;

hash the originating address with a temporary identifier comprising a first time period in which the request message is received, wherein the temporary identifier remains constant during the first time period;

create a unique identifier for the electronic device based on the hashing, wherein the hashing provides the same unique identifier during the first time period, and wherein the unique identifier remains constant for the first time period before changing;

replace the originating address in the request with the unique identifier that shields device identifying information of the electronic device from an advertisement provider server communicatively coupled to the advertisement gateway by hiding the originating address from the advertisement provider server and providing the unique identifier only during the given time period prior to changing the unique identifier;

send the request comprising the unique identifier to an advertisement provider server;

in response to the request sent to the advertisement provider server, receive content from the advertisement provider server based on the request comprising the unique identifier;

based on the content received from the advertisement provider server, detect that the content comprises an external content source reference that identifies a content provider server for the electronic device to contact directly;

in response to the detecting, embed a parameter in the content to correspond with the external content source reference identifying the content provider server;

rewrite the content to use a proxy reference identifying the advertisement gateway instead of using the external content source reference that identifies the content provider server;

based on the embedding and the rewriting, create a modified content comprising the embedded parameter and the proxy reference identifying the advertisement gateway; and

send the modified content to the electronic device.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the originating address is in the header of the request.

18. The system of claim 16, wherein the originating address comprises at least one of:

an originating IP address, a mobile ID number, an application identification, or a pinsight ID.

19. The system of claim 16, wherein the temporary identifier comprises a temporal identifier.

20. The system of claim 16, wherein the unique identifier comprises an IP address format.