Systems and Methods to Emulate User Network Activity

• US 20100094612A1
• Filed: 10/09/2008
• Published: 04/15/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 10/09/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Weerasinghe, Srilal
• Granted Patent: US 8,463,897 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 703/23
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3495 for systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/875 Monitoring of systems including the internet
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0876 Network utilisation, e.g. volume of load or congestion level
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/234 for tracking messages
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34

Abstract

Systems and methods to emulate user network activity to change the profiling of users of the network are disclosed. A method includes monitoring network activity corresponding to a particular user. The method includes automatically generating emulated user network activity when a usage pattern is detected in the monitored network activity. The emulated user network activity may be detectable by a user tracking engine as the network activity of the particular user and the user tracking engine may attempt to profile the emulated user activity.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

monitoring a network activity corresponding to a particular user; and

automatically generating emulated user network activity when a usage pattern is detected in the monitored network activity,

wherein the emulated user network activity is detectable by a user tracking engine as the network activity of the particular user.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein automatically generating the emulated user network activity includes at least one of:

sending at least one email message;

initiating at least one messaging session;

submitting at least one search query to a search engine; and

sending a first request to receive website data corresponding to at least one uniform resource locator (URL) and sending a second request to receive website data corresponding to at least one link that is received in the website data.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the emulated user network activity traverses a network in a pre-determined automated manner to thwart end-user profiling by the user tracking engine.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein automatically generating the emulated user network activity is performed at a mobile communications device.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein automatically generating the emulated user network activity comprises:

generating a plurality of email messages containing predetermined keywords; and

sending the plurality of email messages to a plurality of predetermined email addresses.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein automatically generating the emulated user network activity is performed on a set top box and comprises:

sending a request to a video server to change a received channel;

selecting an advertisement included in multimedia content received at the set top box; and

sending a HTTP request corresponding to a link in the selected advertisement to retrieve information concerning an advertised product.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein automatically generating the emulated user network activity is performed at a website'"'"'s server network to change profiling of the website and wherein automatically generating the emulated user network activity comprises:

generating search queries; and

transmitting the search queries to a search engine.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein automatically generating the emulated user network activity is performed by a server that enables multiple users to access a public network to modify profiling of the multiple users.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

selecting at least one keyword from a first list of keywords; and

generating at least a first portion of the emulated user network activity based on the at least one keyword.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the first list of keywords includes keywords that are substantially uncorrelated to a preference or demographic of the particular user to thwart activity-based user profiling by the user tracking engine with respect to the particular user.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the first list of terms includes keywords that correlate to one or more predetermined user profiles to cause the user tracking engine to determine an inaccurate profile of the particular user.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein automatically generating the emulated user network activity includes automatically sending a plurality of requests to access network resources via a public network.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein automatically sending the plurality of requests to access network resources comprises automatically generating a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) request to a network resource and sending the HTTP request via the public network.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein automatically generating the HTTP request comprises automatically selecting a link to the network resource from a previously accessed network resource.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the previously accessed network resource is identified by a search results list corresponding to a query submitted to a search engine.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the automatically generated HTTP request comprises header information mimicking an end-user computing device.

17. A system comprising:

a processor; and

a memory accessible to the processor, the memory including;

an anti-profiling component that is executable by the processor to automatically send a plurality of requests to network resources via a public network in response to detecting an activity of a user, wherein the plurality of requests are configured to be detected by a tracking engine as network activity of the user and to be used by the tracking engine to generate an obscured profile of the user; and

a first list of approved terms to be used by the anti-profiling component to include in at least one request of the plurality of requests.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the user tracking engine associates content or keywords with user profiles based on web browsing activities, email messaging, search engine queries, or instant messaging sessions, and wherein the anti-profiling component is configured to obfuscate the activity of the user by generating the plurality of requests to network resources that are not associated with the activity of the user.

19. The system of claim 17, further comprising an instant messaging (M) emulation component that is responsive to the anti-profiling component to establish an IM session via the public network.

20. The system of claim 17, further comprising a web browsing emulation component that is responsive to the anti-profiling component and configured to emulate at least one user web browsing session.

21. The system of claim 17, further comprising a web search emulation component configured to submit at least one user web search query to a search engine and to submit a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) request corresponding to at least one link from search results generated by the search engine.

22. The system of claim 17, further comprising a second list of prohibited terms stored at the memory, and wherein the anti-profiling component is configured to access the second list prior to sending the plurality of requests.

23. The system of claim 20, wherein the anti-profiling component is configured to generate the plurality of requests using a whitelist that includes the first list of approved terms and using a blacklist that includes the second list of prohibited terms.

24. The system of claim 21, wherein the whitelist further includes a list of approved uniform resource locators (UTRLs) and wherein the blacklist further includes a list of prohibited URLs.

25. The system of claim 17, further comprising a streaming media component configured to send a request to a video server of an Internet Protocol television (IPTV) system to receive streaming media content.