Message rendering for identification of content features

• US 20040221062A1
• Filed: 05/02/2003
• Published: 11/04/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 05/02/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Rounthwaite, Robert L., Goodman, Joshua T., Heckerman, David E., Starbuck, Bryan T.
• Granted Patent: US 7,483,947 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/246
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/212 using filtering or selective blocking

Abstract

Architecture for detecting and removing obfuscating clutter from the subject and/or body of a message, e.g., e-mail, prior to filtering of the message, to identify junk messages commonly referred to as spam. The technique utilizes the powerful features built into an HTML rendering engine to strip the HTML instructions for all non-substantive aspects of the message. Pre-processing includes pre-rendering of the message into a final format, which final format is that which is displayed by the rendering engine to the user. The final format message is then converted to a text-only format to remove graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing that cannot be rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters. The result is essentially to reduce each message to its common denominator essentials so that the junk mail filter can view each message on an equal basis.

Claims

1. A system that facilitates message filtering, comprising:

a pre-rendering component that receives a message and renders the message into a first format; and

a converting component that converts the message of the first format into a character-only message.

2. The system of claim 1, the pre-rendering component is a display engine, such that the message of the first format is that format which is displayed to a user.

3. The system of claim 1, the pre-rendering component is a display engine that renders the message into the first format by at least one of applying appropriate decoding, removing comments, applying decoration, skipping invalid decoration commands, and applying final positioning.

4. The system of claim 1, the converting component removing from the message of the first format at least one of graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing not rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters.

5. The system of claim 4, at least one of the graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing not rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters, is utilized to effect a weight of a word in a filter.

6. The system of claim 1, the message analyzed for at least one of embedded tags and comments.

7. The system of claim 1, the message rendered and analyzed for raw HTML features.

8. The system of claim 1, the character-only format is a text-only format.

9. The system of claim 8, the message in text-only format is processed to analyze a word or plurality of words for at least one of font size, brightness, special formatting, and placement in a link.

10. The system of claim 1, the word or plurality of words removed from the message when one or more of the word(s) or one or more characters of the word(s) are invisible or substantially invisible.

11. The system of claim 1, the message is e-mail.

12. A computer including the system of claim 1.

13. A network having a filtering system according to claim 1.

14. The system of claim 1, the message including an image that is decompressed for analysis of junk indicia.

15. The system of claim 1, the message including a plurality of chained images that are decompressed for analysis of junk indicia.

16. The system of claim 1, the message including one or more images for each of which there is a hash generated, which hash is used to determine if the message contains junk indicia.

17. The system of claim 1, the message including one or more compressed images for each of which there is a first hash generated, which images are further rendered in an uncompressed mode and a second hash generated, the first and second hashes compared to determine if the message contains junk indicia.

18. The system of claim 1, the pre-rendering component rendering multiple images by decompressing the multiple images next to each other for analysis of junk indicia.

19. The system of claim 1, the converting component performing word segmentation of the character-only message based upon color and/or visibility of at least one of a character, word and text of the message.

20. The system of claim 1, further comprising a non-text decoding component for decoding non-text-encoded portions of the message.

21. The system of claim 20, the non-text decoding component is a MIME decoder.

22. The system of claim 1, further comprising the capability to process images to ascertain if the image is junk-related by determining at least one of the image size, image dimension, image type, image location, number of images, area consumed by a plurality of the images, and whether the image is externally linked.

23. A message filtering system, comprising:

a pre-rendering component that receives the message, and renders the message in a user-perceivable format;

a converting component for converting the rendered message into a text-only message; and

a filtering component that filters the text-only message based upon predetermined content.

24. The system of claim 23, the pre-rendering component is a display engine that renders the message in the user-perceivable format, which format is that which would be presented to a user via a display.

25. The system of claim 23, the pre-rendering component is a display engine that renders the message, which is an e-mail message, into the user-perceivable format by at least one of applying appropriate decoding, removing comments, applying decoration, skipping invalid decoration commands, and applying final positioning.

26. The system of claim 23, the converting component removing from the rendered message at least one of graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing not rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters.

27. The system of claim 26, at least one of the graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing not rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters, is utilized by the filtering component to change a weighting parameter of at least one of a character, word, and the text.

28. The system of claim 23, the filtering component filters the text-only message of the predetermined content, the filtering component including a weighting component that adjusts a weighting parameter associated with text of the text-only message to determine if the associated text should be removed.

29. The system of claim 23, the text-only message analyzed for at least one of embedded tags, comments and, invisible and substantially invisible text.

30. The system of claim 23, the filter component including a support vector machine utilized for determining a weight of a word.

31. The system of claim 23, further comprising a non-text decoding component for decoding non-text-encoded portions of the message.

32. The system of claim 23, further comprising the capability to process images to ascertain if the image is junk-related by determining at least one of the image size, image dimension, image type, image location, number of images, area consumed by a plurality of the images, and whether the image is externally linked.

33. A system for preparing a message for filtering, comprising;

means for pre-rendering the message into a first format; and

means for converting the message of the first format into a character-only message.

34. The system of claim 33, the pre-rendering means is a display engine that renders the message, which is an e-mail message, into the first format by at least one of applying appropriate decoding, removing comments, applying decoration, skipping invalid decoration commands, and applying final positioning.

35. The system of claim 33, the converting means removing from the rendered message at least one of graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing not rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters.

36. The system of claim 35, at least one of the graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing not rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters, is utilized by a filtering component to change a weighting parameter associated with at least one of a character, word, and text.

37. The system of claim 33, further comprising means for non-text decoding of non-text-encoded portions of the message.

38. The system of claim 33, further comprising processing means for processing images to ascertain if the image is junk-related by determining at least one of the image size, image dimension, image type, image location, number of images, area consumed by a plurality of the images, and whether the image is externally linked.

39. A method of message pre-processing for a filter, comprising;

pre-rendering the message into a first format; and

converting the message of the first format into a character-only message.

40. The method of claim 39, the message pre-rendered with a display engine, such that the message of the first format is that format which is displayed to a user.

41. The method of claim 39, the message pre-rendered with a display engine that renders the message into the first format by at least one of applying appropriate decoding, removing comments, applying decoration, skipping invalid decoration commands, and applying final positioning.

42. The method of claim 39, the message of the first format converted by removing at least one of graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing not rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters.

43. The method of claim 39, the message analyzed for at least one of embedded tags and comments.

44. The method of claim 39, the message rendered and analyzed for raw HTML features.

45. The method of claim 39, the character-only format is a text-only format.

46. The method of claim 45, the message in text-only format is processed to analyze a word or plurality of words for at least one of font size, brightness, special formatting, and placement in a link.

47. The method of claim 46, the word or plurality of words are removed from the message when one or more of the word(s) or one or more characters of the word(s) are invisible or substantially invisible.

48. The method of claim 39, the message is e-mail.

49. The method of claim 39, further comprising a non-text decoding component for decoding non-text-encoded portions of the message.

50. The method of claim 49, the non-text decoding component is a MIME decoder.

51. The method of claim 39, further comprising the capability to process images to ascertain if the image is junk-related by determining at least one of the image size, image dimension, image type, image location, number of images, area consumed by a plurality of the images, and whether the image is externally linked.

52. A method of filtering a message, comprising;

pre-rendering the message into a final format;

converting the message of the final format into a text-only message;

processing the text-only message for predetermined content; and

routing the message based upon the predetermined content.

53. The method of claim 52, the message pre-rendered with a display engine that renders the message into the final format by at least one of applying appropriate decoding, removing comments, applying decoration, skipping invalid decoration commands, and applying final positioning.

54. The method of claim 52, the message of the final format converted by removing at least one of graphics, color, non-text decoration, and spacing not rendered as ASCII-style or Unicode-style characters.

55. The method of claim 52, the text-only message processed by further analyzing the text-only message for predetermined content, which if present, the message is routed to be deleted, and if not present, the message is routed to an inbox.

56. The method of claim 52, the text-only message processed by further analyzing the text-only message to adjust a weighting parameter associated one or more words of the text-only message, the weighting parameter based upon character features of the word, which character features include at least one of size, color, font, formatting, and inclusion of the text within a link.

57. The method of claim 52, the message analyzed for at least one of embedded tags, comments, and raw HTML features.

58. The method of claim 52, the text-only message processed with a filtering component to filter for the predetermined content.

59. The method of claim 58, the filtering component further including a weighting component that adjusts a weighting parameter associated with at least one of a character and a word, of the text-only message, the weighting parameter based upon a corresponding feature of the character or the word.

60. The method of claim 59, the feature of the character or word including at least one of size, color, font, formatting, and inclusion of the character within a link.

61. The method of claim 52, further comprising a MIME decoding component for decoding MIME encoded portions of the message.

62. The method of claim 61, the output of the MIME decoding component passed to a junk filter as an input.

63. The method of claim 52, further comprising the capability to process images to ascertain if the image is junk-related by determining at least one of the image size, image dimension, image type, image location, number of images, area consumed by a plurality of the images, and whether the image is externally linked.

64. The method of claim 52, wherein rendered text and unrendered text is passed to a junk filter.