Community safety, security, health communication and emergency notification system with common short code SMS communication capabilities

• US 10,448,212 B2
• Filed: 12/17/2018
• Issued: 10/15/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 01/20/2018
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Titan Health & Security Technologies, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Titan Health & Security Technologies, Inc.
• Inventors: Merjanian, Vic A., Samra, Paul E., Khalili, Ryan, Juarez, Eduardo
• Primary Examiner(s): Cai, Wayne H
• Application Number:
  US16/221,996
• Publication Number:
  US 20190230466A1
• Time in Patent Office: 302 Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/023 using mutual or relative location information between multiple location based services [LBS] targets or of distance thresholds
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/06 Selective distribution of broadcast services, e.g. multimedia broadcast multicast service [MBMS]; Services to user groups; One-way selective calling services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/08 User group management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/14 Short messaging services, e.g. short message services [SMS] or unstructured supplementary service data [USSD]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/90 Services for handling of emergency or hazardous situations, e.g. earthquake and tsunami warning systems [ETWS]

Abstract

A community safety system (CSS) including a notification management entity (NME) comprising servers, the NME communicatively coupled to multiple user devices and one or more administrator devices (collectively, registered user devices). The CSS includes a plurality of registered users, wherein registered users may be associated with an organization, and a user category of a set of user categories. The NME may maintain a list of the registered users and associated information. The registered users may have user devices including a CSS application operating thereon, or SMS messaging program operating thereon. In some embodiments the CSS enables SMS-to-CSS App communications, and vice versa, enriching the CSS with information from users employing disparate communication platforms on their devices.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a notification management entity comprising one or more servers, the notification management entity communicatively coupled to one or more user devices and one or more administrator devices, the notification management entity maintaining a list including registered users, wherein the notification management entity is configured, responsive to receiving an incoming free-form SMS message, to;

identify a phone number associated with a device from which the incoming free-form SMS message was sent;

determine whether the phone number is associated with a registered user to whom a broadcast notification has been sent;

determine, responsive to a determination that the phone number is associated with the registered user to whom the broadcast notification has been sent, whether the incoming free-form SMS message includes a hotkey associated with a subset of users; and

relay, responsive to a determination that the incoming free-form SMS messages includes the hotkey associated with the subset of users, the incoming free-form SMS message to one or more user devices of the subset of users.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the notification management entity is further configured to:

determine, responsive to a determination that the phone number is not associated with a registered user to whom the broadcast notification has been sent, whether the registered user associated with the phone number has authorization to initiate free-form SMS broadcast notifications; and

relay, responsive to a determination that the registered user associated with the phone number has authorization to initiate free-form SMS broadcast notifications, the incoming free-form SMS message to at least one of the one or more administrator devices.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the notification management entity is further configured to:

discard, responsive to a determination that the registered user associated with the phone number does not have authorization to initiate free-form SMS broadcast notifications, the incoming free-form SMS message.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein discarding the incoming free-form SMS message comprises a deletion operation.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the notification management entity is further configured to:

open a secure communication conference channel between the device from which the incoming free-form SMS message was sent and at least one of the one or more administrator devices.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the notification management entity is further configured to:

monitor communication activity occurring over the secure communication conference channel; and

close the secure communication conference channel responsive to a determination that the communication activity occurring over the secure communication conference channel meets a first non-utilization criteria.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the first non-utilization criteria is met if no communication takes place over the secure communication conference channel for a predefined period of time.

8. The system of claim 6, wherein the notification management entity is further configured to:

notify one or more additional administrators or one or more additional registered users of an ongoing secure communication conference channel;

provide the one or more additional administrators or the additional one or more registered users with an access link and an authentication key to access the ongoing secure communication conference channel;

prompt, upon a recipient administrator'"'"'s or a recipient registered user'"'"'s selection of the access link for the ongoing secure communication conference channel, the selecting recipient administrator or the selecting recipient registered user to enter the authorization key; and

join, responsive to a determination that the selecting recipient administrator or the selecting recipient registered user entering the authorization key, such selecting recipient administrator or selecting recipient registered user into the ongoing secure communication conference channel.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the notification management entity is further configured to:

monitor communication activity occurring over the ongoing secure communication conference channel;

close the ongoing secure communication conference channel responsive to a determination that the communication activity occurring over the ongoing secure communication conference channel meets a second non-utilization criteria.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the second non-utilization criteria is met if no communication takes place over the ongoing secure communication conference channel for a predefined period of time.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein at least one of the one or more administrator devices is associated with an emergency medical services department.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein the incoming free-form SMS message is relayed to the one or more user devices of the subset of users further in response to a determination that an amount of time elapsed between when a last notification was sent and the incoming free-form SMS message was received is less than a predetermined threshold.

13. The system of claim 1, wherein relaying the incoming free-form SMS message to the one or more user devices of the subset of users comprises populating a messaging interface of an application running on the one or more user devices with text of the incoming free-form SMS message.

14. A method comprising:

identifying a phone number associated with a device from which the incoming free-form SMS message was sent;

determining whether the phone number is associated with a registered user to whom a broadcast notification has been sent;

determining, responsive to a determination that the phone number is associated with the registered user to whom the broadcast notification has been sent, whether the incoming free-form SMS message includes a hotkey associated with a subset of users; and

relaying, responsive to a determination that the incoming free-form SMS messages includes the hotkey associated with the subset of users, the incoming free-form SMS message to one or more user devices of the subset of users.

15. The method of claim 14, further comprising:

determining, responsive to a determination that the phone number is not associated with a registered user to whom the broadcast notification has been sent, whether the registered user associated with the phone number has authorization to initiate free-form SMS broadcast notifications; and

relaying, responsive to a determination that the registered user associated with the phone number has authorization to initiate free-form SMS broadcast notifications, the incoming free-form SMS message to one or more administrator devices.

16. The method of claim 14, further comprising:

opening a secure communication conference channel between the device from which the incoming free-form SMS message was sent and one or more administrator devices.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

monitoring communication activity occurring over the secure communication conference channel; and

closing the secure communication conference channel responsive to a determination that the communication activity occurring over the secure communication conference channel meets a non-utilization criteria.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the non-utilization criteria is met if no communication takes place over the secure communication conference channel for a predefined period of time.

19. The method of claim 17, further comprising:

notifying one or more additional administrators or one or more additional registered users of an ongoing secure communication conference channel;

providing the one or more additional administrators or the additional one or more registered users with an access link and an authentication key to access the ongoing secure communication conference channel;

prompting, upon a recipient administrator'"'"'s or a recipient registered user'"'"'s selection of the access link for the ongoing secure communication conference channel, the selecting recipient administrator or the selecting recipient registered user to enter the authorization key; and

joining, responsive to a determination that the selecting recipient administrator or the selecting recipient registered user entering the authorization key, such selecting recipient administrator or selecting recipient registered user into the ongoing secure communication conference channel.

20. A non-transitory computer readable storing machine readable instructions which, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to:

identify a phone number associated with a device from which an incoming free-form SMS message was sent;

determine whether the phone number is associated with a registered user to whom a broadcast notification has been sent;

determine, responsive to a determination that the phone number is associated with a registered user to whom the broadcast notification has been sent, whether the incoming free-form SMS message includes a hotkey associated with a subset of users; and

relay, responsive to a determination that the incoming free-form SMS messages includes the hotkey associated with the subset of users, the incoming free-form SMS message to one or more user devices of the subset of users.