Scoring Persons and Files for Trust in Digital Communication

• US 20100169265A1
• Filed: 12/30/2008
• Published: 07/01/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 12/30/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Genesys Cloud Services Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories Incorporated (Genesys Cloud Services Incorporated)
• Inventors: Perlmutter, S. Michael, Ristock, Herbert Willi Artur, Galvin, Brian
• Granted Patent: US 9,979,737 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 706/52
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0637 Strategic management or analysis, e.g. setting a goal or target of an organisation; Planning actions based on goals; Analysis or evaluation of effectiveness of goals
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/105 Human resources
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/126 the source of the received data

Abstract

A method, using trust software executing from a machine-readable medium on a computerized appliance operating as a trust authority, to assign to a person, a file, or an enterprise an indication of trustworthiness, includes steps of (a) assembling information concerning the person, file, or enterprise; (b) applying trust logic to the information assembled for individual ones of the persons, files or enterprises to assign a trust score; and (c) storing the score associated with at least an identity of the person, file or enterprise.

Claims

1. A method, using trust software executing from a machine-readable medium on a computerized appliance operating as a trust authority, to assign to a person, a file, or an enterprise an indication of trustworthiness, comprising steps of:

(a) assembling information concerning the person, file, or enterprise;

(b) applying trust logic to the information assembled for individual ones of the persons, files or enterprises to assign a trust score; and

(c) storing the score associated with at least an identity of the person, file or enterprise.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising a step for transmitting the trust score via a network to a computerized workstation other than the computerized appliance upon which the score is determined.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the computerized workstation executes trust software, and provides a symbolic indicia of trustworthiness in a display of the computerized workstation in response to a trust score received.

4. The method of claim 3 wherein the symbolic indicia is displayed as a result of a communication using a communication application on the computerized appliance, wherein the trust score associated with the indicia is also associated with a communicant in the communication.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the communication application is one of an email client, a messaging application, or a telephony application.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the communication application is a part of the trust software executing on the computerized workstation, and monitors activities associated with a separate telephony appliance coupled to either a wireless network or a land-line network.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the information concerning the person, the file or the enterprise is information provided voluntarily by enterprises.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the information provided voluntarily by the enterprise is information concerning agents associated with the enterprise.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the information concerning the person, the file or the enterprise is information pulled by the trust authority from other network-connected sources.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the information assembled in step (a) concerning a person includes information about skills possessed by that person.

11. The method of claim 1 wherein information assembled in step (a) concerning a person or an enterprise is information provided by individual persons to the trust authority, based on personal experience of the individual persons regarding the person or enterprise about which the information is assembled.

12. The method of claim 2 wherein the computerized workstation executes trust software, and assigns a trust metric to a file, the metric associated with a level of trust at which the person assigning the metric wishes the file to be treated by other computerized equipment executing trust software.

13. The method of claim 1 wherein, in step (a) information is assembled by monitoring characteristics of an active communication between one computerized workstation and another, identity of the communicants is noted, and in step (b) trust logic is applied to the information to determine a dynamic trust score for one or both of the communicants.

14. The method of claim 13 wherein the communication is voice communication, and the characteristics monitored include one or more of volume, inflection, and words or phrases used.

15. The method of claim 13 wherein the communication is in text, and the characteristics monitored include one or more of sentence structure and words and phrases used.

16. A trust scoring system comprising:

a computerized appliance operating as a trust authority, executing trust software from a machine-readable medium;

a data repository coupled to the computerized appliance; and

one or more ports coupling the computerized appliance to one or more networks;

wherein the appliance assembles information concerning a person, a file, or an enterprise, applies trust logic to the information to determine a trust score, and stores the score determined in the data repository associated with at least an identity of the person, file or enterprise.

17. The system of claim 16 wherein the appliance further transmits the trust score via the ports and one or more networks to a computerized workstation other than the computerized appliance upon which the score is determined.

18. The system of claim 17 wherein the computerized workstation also executes trust software, and provides a symbolic indicia of trustworthiness in a display of the computerized workstation in response to a trust score received.

19. The system of claim 18 wherein the symbolic indicia is displayed as a result of a communication using a communication application on the computerized appliance, wherein the trust score associated with the indicia is also associated with a communicant in the communication.

20. The system of claim 19 wherein the communication application is one of an email client, a messaging application, or a telephony application.

21. The system of claim 20 wherein the communication application is a part of the trust software executing on the computerized workstation, and monitors activities associated with a separate telephony appliance coupled to either a wireless network or a land-line network.

22. The system of claim 16 wherein the information concerning the person, the file or the enterprise is information provided voluntarily by enterprises.

23. The system of claim 22 wherein the information provided voluntarily by the enterprise is information concerning agents associated with the enterprise.

24. The system of claim 16 wherein the information concerning the person, the file or the enterprise is information pulled by the trust authority from other network-connected sources.

25. The system of claim 16 wherein the information assembled in step (a) concerning a person includes information about skills possessed by that person.

26. The system of claim 16 wherein information assembled in step (a) concerning a person or an enterprise is information provided by individual persons to the trust authority, based on personal experience of the individual persons regarding the person or enterprise about which the information is assembled.

27. The system of claim 17 wherein the computerized workstation executes trust software, and assigns a trust metric to a file, the metric associated with a level of trust at which the person assigning the metric wishes the file to be treated by other computerized equipment executing trust software.

28. The system of claim 16 wherein, in step (a) information is assembled by monitoring characteristics of an active communication between one computerized workstation and another, identity of the communicants is noted, and in step (b) trust logic is applied to the information to determine a dynamic trust score for one or both of the communicants.

29. The system of claim 28 wherein the communication is voice communication, and the characteristics monitored include one or more of volume, inflection, and words or phrases used.

30. The system of claim 28 wherein the communication is in text, and the characteristics monitored include one or more of sentence structure and words and phrases used.