PRIVACY PROTECTION AND IDENTITY VERIFICATION IN ONLINE SOCIAL NETWORKS WITH EXTENSION TO PUBLIC SWITCHED TELEPHONE NETWORKS
First Claim
1. A method for allowing members of social network communities to communicate using the public switched telephone network without fear of revealing the real phone numbers of both parties, while the called party can be assured the calling party is one that he or she is willing to accept, comprising:
- advertising access phone numbers for each community through which the members can call each other with the public switched telephone network;
assigning a unique member ID to each member;
a member profile storing each member'"'"'s information for each community;
a member profile interface allowing members access, with a PIN or password, to their member profile information stored in a database;
accepting a call to any one of the access phone numbers of an online community from a member;
accessing the member profile;
associating the calling party with the member ID of the caller;
associating the called party with the member ID provided by the caller when making the call;
verifying the identity of the calling party against the member profile database;
filtering the calls without knowing the calling party'"'"'s public switch telephone network number;
originating a phone call to the called party via the public switched telephone network on behalf of the caller and bridging the incoming call to the called party.saving the member ID of the calling party in the member profile of the called party;
hiding the real phone numbers of each party from the other.
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Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention describes a method and apparatus for protecting the privacy and verifying the identities of both calling and called parties in online social networks, with an extension to the public switched telephone networks. More specifically, this invention relates to the distribution of unique user identities in social networks to be used in public telephone networks providing privacy protection of both calling and called parties, while the calling party'"'"'s identify can be verified. The user identity of the calling party, which is different from the real phone number of the calling party, can be used as part of the call filtering feature of the called party. None of the real phone numbers are revealed to the other party of a phone call using the public switched telephone networks.
40 Citations
40 Claims
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1. A method for allowing members of social network communities to communicate using the public switched telephone network without fear of revealing the real phone numbers of both parties, while the called party can be assured the calling party is one that he or she is willing to accept, comprising:
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advertising access phone numbers for each community through which the members can call each other with the public switched telephone network; assigning a unique member ID to each member; a member profile storing each member'"'"'s information for each community; a member profile interface allowing members access, with a PIN or password, to their member profile information stored in a database; accepting a call to any one of the access phone numbers of an online community from a member; accessing the member profile; associating the calling party with the member ID of the caller; associating the called party with the member ID provided by the caller when making the call; verifying the identity of the calling party against the member profile database; filtering the calls without knowing the calling party'"'"'s public switch telephone network number; originating a phone call to the called party via the public switched telephone network on behalf of the caller and bridging the incoming call to the called party. saving the member ID of the calling party in the member profile of the called party; hiding the real phone numbers of each party from the other. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 40)
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20. A call processing server for providing the call processing service of this invention, the server comprising:
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a processor to execute computer instructions; a memory to store computer program instructions executable by a processor; a member profile database; and computer program instructions stored in the memory and executable to perform the steps of; accepting a call to any one of the access phone numbers of an online community from a member, accessing the member profile using the calling party'"'"'s caller ID or member ID, associating the calling party with the member ID of the caller, verifying the identity of the calling party against the member profile database, associating the called party with the member ID provided by the caller when making the call, filtering the calls without knowing the calling party'"'"'s public switch telephone network number, originating a phone call to the called party via the public switched telephone network on behalf of the caller, and bridging the incoming call to the called party, saving the member ID of the calling party in the member profile of the called party, hiding the real phone numbers of both parties from each other. - View Dependent Claims (21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38)
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39. A computer program product for providing the call processing service of this invention, comprising:
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a computer readable storage medium; computer program instructions recorded on the computer readable medium, executable by a processor, for performing the steps of; accepting a call to any one of the access phone numbers of an online community from a member, accessing the member profile using the calling party'"'"'s caller ID or member ID, associating the calling party with the member ID of the caller, associating the called party with the member ID provided by the caller when making the call, verifying the identity of the calling party against the member profile database, filtering the calls without knowing the calling party'"'"'s public switch telephone network number, originating a phone call to the called party via the public switched telephone network on behalf of the caller, and bridging the incoming call to the called party, saving the member ID of the calling party in the member profile of the called party, hiding the real phone numbers of both parties from each other.
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Specification