Micro-payment system architecture

• US 20060080238A1
• Filed: 11/24/2004
• Published: 04/13/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 08/30/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Perrochon, Louis Vincent, Crespo, Arturo, Harik, Georges, Nielsen, Thomas A., Ling, Benjamin Chan-Bin, Piscitello, John Dominick
• Granted Patent: US 8,027,918 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/102 Bill distribution or payments
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/12 specially adapted for electronic shopping systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/29 characterised by micropayments
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/00 Commerce
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0609 Buyer or seller confidence or verification
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0617 Representative agent
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0619 Neutral agent
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/00 Finance; Insurance; Tax strategies; Processing of corporate or income taxes
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/03 Credit; Loans; Processing thereof

Abstract

A micro-payment system has buyers, sellers, and a broker. The buyers establish accounts with the broker and provide payment information allowing the broker to invoice the buyers. The sellers establish accounts with the brokers and specify terms for accessing items, including electronic content, available from the sellers. The sellers also provide payment information that allows the broker to credit the sellers for sales of the items. The broker aggregates the buyers'"'"' micro-payment purchases and invoices the buyers. The broker also aggregates the sellers'"'"' micro-payment sales and credits the sellers.

Claims

1. A broker for facilitating transactions between buyers and sellers in a micro-payment system, the broker comprising:

a seller access module for establishing accounts for a plurality of sellers in the micro-payment system, the sellers selling items that can be purchased by buyers in micro-payment transactions;

a buyer access module for establishing accounts for a plurality of buyers in the micro-payment system, wherein the buyers can purchase items offered by the sellers; and

an accounting module for enabling the buyers to engage in micro-payment transactions to purchase items offered by the sellers, for aggregating each buyer'"'"'s purchases and invoicing each buyer for its respective aggregate purchases, and for aggregating each seller'"'"'s sales and crediting each seller for its respective aggregate sales.

2. The broker of claim 1, wherein the buyer access module comprises:

payment information enabling the broker to invoice the buyers for the buyers'"'"' transactions;

billing rules specifying billing terms for transactions engaged in by the buyers; and

notification rules describing if and/or when the buyers are to be notified of purchases made in the micro-payment system.

3. The broker of claim 1, wherein the items offered by a seller include electronic content and further comprising:

a content rules module for storing rules describing the electronic content available from the seller and terms of access to the content.

4. The broker of claim 3, wherein the content rules module comprises:

access rules specifying terms of access to the electronic content available from the seller;

pricing and payment rules specifying fees associated with purchasing the electronic content from the seller; and

delivery rules specifying how purchased electronic content is delivered to a buyer.

5. The broker of claim 1, wherein the items offered by a seller include electronic content and further comprising:

a content indexing module for indexing electronic content offered by the seller.

6. The broker of claim 5, wherein electronic content offered by the seller includes links to other content offered by the seller, the content indexing module comprising:

a crawler module for following the links in the electronic content offered by the seller to index the linked-to set of electronic content offered by the seller.

7. The broker of claim 1, further comprising:

a searching interface module for receiving search queries from the buyers and presenting the buyers with descriptions of items offered by the sellers that are responsive to the queries.

8. The broker of claim 1, wherein the items offered by a seller include electronic content and further comprising:

a content proxy module for storing electronic content offered by the seller and providing the electronic content from the broker to a buyer in response to the buyer purchasing the electronic content.

9. The broker of claim 1, wherein a seller is adapted to issue cookies uniquely identifying buyers to the seller and wherein the broker further comprises:

a cookie cache for storing the cookies issued by the seller and for providing a cookie to the seller responsive to the buyer identified by the cookie interacting with content from the seller.

10. The broker of claim 1, further comprising:

a reputation module for determining a reputation score representing the quality of items from a seller, wherein the broker provides the reputation score to the buyers.

11. The broker of claim 1, further comprising:

a fraud detection module for detecting potentially fraudulent usage of the broker.

12. The broker of claim 11, wherein the fraud detection module decreases a rate of transactions that can be performed by a buyer and/or seller engaged in a potentially-fraudulent transaction.

13. A method of facilitating transactions between buyers and sellers in a micro-payment system, comprising:

establishing accounts for a plurality of sellers in the micro-payment system, the sellers selling items that can be purchased by buyers in micro-payment transactions;

establishing accounts for a plurality of buyers in the micro-payment system, wherein the buyers can purchase items offered by the sellers;

aggregating each buyer'"'"'s purchases and invoicing each buyer for the buyer'"'"'s respective aggregate purchases; and

aggregating each seller'"'"'s sales and crediting each seller for the seller'"'"'s respective aggregate sales.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein establishing accounts for a plurality of buyers comprises:

establishing payment information enabling invoicing of the buyers for the buyers'"'"' transactions;

establishing billing rules specifying billing terms for transactions engaged in by the buyers; and

establishing notification rules describing if and/or when the buyers are to be notified of purchases made in the micro-payment system.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the items offered by a seller includes electronic content and wherein establishing accounts for a plurality of sellers comprises:

establishing access rules specifying terms of access to the electronic content available from the seller;

establishing pricing and payment rules specifying fees associated with purchasing the electronic content from the seller; and

establishing delivery rules specifying how purchased electronic content is delivered to a buyer.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the items offered by a seller include electronic content and further comprising:

indexing electronic content offered by the seller; and

provides a representation of the indexed electronic content to the buyers to enable the buyers to identify electronic content the buyers desire to purchase.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein electronic content offered by the seller includes links to other content offered by the seller, the indexing comprising:

following the links in the electronic content offered by the seller to index the linked-to set of electronic content offered by the seller.

18. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

receiving search queries from the buyers and presenting the buyers with descriptions of items offered by the sellers that are responsive to the queries.

19. The method of claim 13, wherein the items offered by a seller include electronic content and further comprising:

storing electronic content offered by the seller and providing the stored electronic content to a buyer in response to the buyer purchasing the electronic content.

20. The method of claim 13, wherein a seller is adapted to issue cookies uniquely identifying buyers to the seller and further comprising:

storing the cookies issued by the seller and providing a cookie to the seller responsive to the buyer identified by the cookie interacting with content from the seller.

21. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

determining a reputation score representing the quality of items from a seller; and

providing the reputation score to the buyers.

22. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

detecting a potentially fraudulent micro-payment transaction; and

decreasing a rate of transactions that can be performed by a buyer and/or seller engaged in the potentially-fraudulent transaction.

23. A computer program product comprising:

a computer-readable medium having computer program logic embodied therein for brokering between buyers and sellers in a micro-payment system, the computer program logic comprising;

a seller access module for establishing accounts for a plurality of sellers in the micro-payment system, the sellers selling items that can be purchased by buyers in micro-payment transactions;

a buyer access module for establishing accounts for a plurality of buyers in the micro-payment system, wherein the buyers can purchase items offered by the sellers; and

an accounting module for enabling the buyers to engage in micro-payment transactions to purchase items offered by the sellers, for aggregating each buyer'"'"'s purchases and invoicing each buyer for its respective aggregate purchases, and for aggregating each seller'"'"'s sales and crediting each seller for its respective aggregate sales.

24. The computer program product of claim 23, wherein the buyer access module comprises:

payment information enabling invoicing of the buyers for the buyers'"'"' transactions;

billing rules specifying billing terms for transactions engaged in by the buyers; and

notification rules describing if and/or when the buyers are to be notified of purchases made in the micro-payment system.

25. The computer program product of claim 23, wherein the items offered by a seller include electronic content and further comprising:

a content rules module for storing rules describing the electronic content available from the seller and terms of access to the content.

26. The computer program product of claim 25, wherein the content rules module comprises:

access rules specifying terms of access to the electronic content available from the seller;

pricing and payment rules specifying fees associated with purchasing the electronic content from the seller; and

delivery rules specifying how purchased electronic content is delivered to a buyer.

27. The computer program product of claim 23, wherein the items offered by a seller include electronic content and further comprising:

a content indexing module for indexing electronic content offered by the seller.

28. The computer program product of claim 27, wherein electronic content offered by the seller includes links to other content offered by the seller, the content indexing module comprising:

a crawler module for following the links in the electronic content offered by the seller to index the linked-to set of electronic content offered by the seller.

29. The computer program product of claim 23, further comprising:

a searching interface module for receiving search queries from the buyers and presenting the buyers with descriptions of items offered by the sellers that are responsive to the queries.

30. The computer program product of claim 23, wherein the items offered by a seller include electronic content and further comprising:

a content proxy module for storing electronic content offered by the seller and providing the stored electronic content to a buyer in response to the buyer purchasing the electronic content.

31. The computer program product of claim 23, wherein a seller is adapted to issue cookies uniquely identifying buyers to the seller and further comprising:

a cookie cache for storing the cookies issued by the seller and for providing a cookie to the seller responsive to the buyer identified by the cookie interacting with content from the seller.

32. The computer program product of claim 23, further comprising:

a reputation module for determining a reputation score representing the quality of items from a seller.

33. The computer program product of claim 23, further comprising:

a fraud detection module for detecting potentially fraudulent brokered transactions.

34. The computer program product of claim 33, wherein the fraud detection module decreases a rate of transactions that can be performed by a buyer and/or seller engaged in a potentially-fraudulent transaction.

35. A broker for facilitating transactions between buyers and sellers in a micro-payment system, the broker comprising:

a seller access module for establishing accounts for a plurality of sellers in the micro-payment system, the sellers selling electronic content that can be purchased by buyers in micro-payment transactions;

a buyer access module for establishing accounts for a plurality of buyers in the micro-payment system, wherein the buyers can purchase electronic content offered by the sellers;

a content indexing module for indexing the electronic content offered by the sellers;

a searching interface module for receiving search queries from the buyers and presenting the buyers with descriptions of the electronic content offered by the sellers that are responsive to the queries;

an accounting module for enabling the buyers to engage in micro-payment transactions to purchase electronic content identified responsive to the queries, for aggregating each buyer'"'"'s purchases and invoicing each buyer for its respective aggregate purchases, and for aggregating each seller'"'"'s sales and crediting each seller for its respective aggregate sales; and

a content proxy module for storing electronic content indexed by the content indexing module and providing the electronic content from the broker to a buyer in response to the buyer purchasing the electronic content.