User experience using privatized crowdsourced data

• US 10,599,867 B2
• Filed: 11/07/2017
• Issued: 03/24/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 06/04/2017
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Bhowmick, Abhishek, Vyrros, Andrew H., Vaishampayan, Umesh S., Decker, Kevin W., Shultz, Conrad, Falkenburg, Steve, Rajca, Mateusz
• Primary Examiner(s): Shaw, Brian F
• Application Number:
  US15/805,591
• Publication Number:
  US 20180349636A1
• Time in Patent Office: 868 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/28 Supervision thereof, e.g. detecting power-supply failure by out of limits supervision
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/6245 Protecting personal data, e.g. for financial or medical purposes
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0483 Interaction with page-structured environments, e.g. book metaphor
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2209/34 Encoding or coding, e.g. Huffman coding or error correction
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2209/42 Anonymization, e.g. involving pseudonyms
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0428 wherein the data content is protected, e.g. by encrypting or encapsulating the payload
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3239 involving non-keyed hash functions, e.g. modification detection codes [MDCs], MD5, SHA or RIPEMD
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/02 Protecting privacy or anonymity, e.g. protecting personally identifiable information [PII]

Abstract

Embodiments described herein provide a privacy mechanism to protect user data when transmitting the data to a server that estimates a frequency of such data amongst a set of client devices. In one embodiment, a differential privacy mechanism is implemented using a count-mean-sketch technique that can reduce resource requirements required to enable privacy while providing provable guarantees regarding privacy and utility. For instance, the mechanism can provide the ability to tailor utility (e.g. accuracy of estimations) against the resource requirements (e.g. transmission bandwidth and computation complexity).

Claims

1. A computing system, comprising:

one or more processors; and

a memory coupled to the one or more processors, the memory storing instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the computing system to perform operations comprising;

receiving, from each of a set of client devices, a privatized encoding of a webpage and a category associated with the webpage, wherein the category relates to inferring a preference for presentation of media content on the webpage;

accumulating privatized encodings from the set of client devices;

estimating a frequency of a selected webpage being associated with the category based on the accumulated privatized encodings from the set of client devices; and

generating a record of an inferred preference for presentation of media content on the selected webpage based on the estimate of the frequency of the selected webpage being associated with the category.

2. The computing system as in claim 1, the operations additionally comprising:

accumulating a sketch of the privatized encodings received from the set of client devices, the sketch including frequency estimations of the privatized encodings; and

estimating a frequency of the selected webpage being associated with the category amongst the frequencies included in the sketch of the privatized encodings.

3. The computing system as in claim 1, wherein estimating the frequency of the selected webpage includes determining a count using a count-mean-sketch operation.

4. The computing system as in claim 1, wherein the category relates to inferring preference with respect to use of a reader mode for display of content on the webpage wherein the reader mode is a mode in which menu items are not displayed.

5. The computing system as in claim 1, wherein the category relates to inferring a preference for content blocking settings for the webpage.

6. The computing system as in claim 1, wherein the category relates to inferring a user preference of enabling auto-play of media content on the webpage.

7. The computing system as in claim 6, wherein generating the record of the inferred preference for presentation of media content on the selected webpage includes operations comprising adding the selected webpage to a whitelist based on an estimated frequency of users providing an inference of a preference to enable auto-play for the webpage, wherein the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which automatic playback is allowed.

8. The computing system as in claim 7, the operations additionally comprising removing the selected webpage from the whitelist or adding the selected webpage to a blacklist based on the estimated frequency of users providing an inference of a preference to disable auto-play for the webpage, wherein the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which auto-play is allowed, and the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which auto-play is disabled.

9. A non-transitory machine-readable medium storing instructions which, when executed by one or more processors of a computing device, cause the computing device to perform operations comprising:

receiving, from each of a set of client devices, a privatized encoding of a webpage and a category associated with the webpage, wherein the category relates to inferring a user preference of enabling auto-play of media content on the webpage;

accumulating privatized encodings from the set of client devices;

estimating a frequency of a selected webpage being associated with the category based on the accumulated privatized encodings from the set of client devices; and

generating a record of an inferred preference for presentation of media content on the selected webpage based on the estimate of the frequency of the selected webpage being associated with the category.

10. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 9, the operations additionally comprising:

accumulating a sketch of the privatized encodings received from the set of client devices, the sketch including frequency estimations of the privatized encodings; and

estimating a frequency of the selected webpage being associated with the category amongst the frequencies included in the sketch of the privatized encodings.

11. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 9, wherein generating the record of the inferred preference for presentation of media content on the selected webpage includes operations comprising adding the selected webpage to a whitelist based on an estimated frequency of users providing an inference of a preference to enable auto-play for the webpage, wherein the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which automatic playback is allowed.

12. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 11, the operations additionally comprising removing the selected webpage from the whitelist or adding the selected webpage to a blacklist based on the estimated frequency of users providing an inference of a preference to disable auto-play for the webpage, wherein the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which auto-play is allowed, and the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which auto-play is disabled.

13. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 12, wherein estimating the frequency of the selected webpage includes determining a count using a count-mean-sketch operation.

14. A method performed on a computing system, the method comprising:

receiving, from each of a set of client devices, a privatized encoding of a webpage and a category associated with the webpage, wherein the category relates to inferring a preference for presentation of media content on the webpage;

accumulating privatized encodings from the set of client devices; and

estimating a frequency of a selected webpage being associated with the category based on the accumulated privatized encodings from the set of client devices; and

generating a record of an inferred preference for presentation of media content on the selected webpage based on the estimate of the frequency of the selected webpage being associated with the category.

15. The method as in claim 14, additionally comprising:

accumulating a sketch of the privatized encodings received from the set of client devices, the sketch including frequency estimations of the privatized encodings; and

estimating a frequency of the selected webpage being associated with the category amongst the frequencies included in the sketch of the privatized encodings.

16. The method as in claim 14, wherein estimating the frequency of the selected webpage includes determining a count using a count-mean-sketch operation.

17. The method as in claim 14, wherein the category relates to inferring preference with respect to use of a reader mode for display of content on the webpage wherein the reader mode is a mode in which menu items are not displayed.

18. The method as in claim 14, wherein the category relates to inferring a preference a preference for content blocking settings for the webpage.

19. The method as in claim 14, wherein the category relates to inferring a user preference of enabling auto-play of media content on the webpage.

20. The method as in claim 19, wherein generating the record of the inferred preference for presentation of media content on the selected webpage includes adding the selected webpage to a whitelist based on an estimated frequency of users providing an inference of a preference to enable auto-play for the webpage, wherein the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which automatic playback is allowed.

21. The method as in claim 20, additionally comprising removing the selected webpage from the whitelist or adding the selected webpage to a blacklist based on the estimated frequency of users providing an inference of a preference to disable auto-play for the webpage, wherein the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which auto-play is allowed, and the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which auto-play is disabled.

22. An electronic device comprising:

one or more processors; and

a memory coupled to the one or more processors, the memory to store instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to;

receive, from each of a set of client devices, a privatized encoding of a webpage and a category associated with the webpage, wherein the category is related to determination of an inferred user preference as to auto-play of media content on the webpage;

accumulate privatized encodings from the set of client devices; and

estimate a frequency of a selected webpage being associated with the category based on the accumulated privatized encodings from the set of client devices; and

generate a record of an inferred preference for presentation of media content on the selected webpage based on the estimate of the frequency of the selected webpage being associated with the category.

23. The electronic device as in claim 22, wherein the instructions additionally cause the one or more processors to:

accumulate a sketch of the privatized encodings received from the set of client devices, wherein the sketch includes frequency estimations of the privatized encodings; and

estimate a frequency of the selected webpage being associated with the category amongst the frequencies included in the sketch of the privatized encodings.

24. The electronic device as in claim 22, wherein to generate the record of the inferred preference for presentation of media content on the selected webpage, the one or more processors are to add the selected webpage to a whitelist based on an estimated frequency of users that provide an inferred preference to enable auto-play for the webpage, wherein the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which automatic playback is allowed.

25. The electronic device as in claim 24, wherein the instructions additionally cause the one or more processors to remove the selected webpage from the whitelist or add the selected webpage to a blacklist based on the estimated frequency of users that provide an inference of a preference to disable auto-play for the webpage, wherein the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which auto-play is allowed, and the whitelist includes a list of webpages for which auto-play is disabled.

26. The electronic device as in claim 25, wherein to estimate the frequency of the selected webpage includes to determine a count using a count-mean-sketch operation.