Devices, Systems and Methods for Location Assistance Verification

• US 20110136472A1
• Filed: 12/07/2009
• Published: 06/09/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/07/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AT&T Mobility II LLC (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Mobility II LLC (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: McNamara, Justin Michael Anthony, Rector, Jay Daryl, Davis, John Potts III
• Granted Patent: US 8,630,622 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/411
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72457 according to geographic location
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72463 to restrict the functionality of the device
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2250/10 including a GPS signal receiver

Abstract

Devices, systems and methods are disclosed which authorize applications to access location-determining technologies on user devices and on service provider networks. An A-GPS agent resident on the device acts as an interface between applications requesting access to the user'"'"'s location from the A-GPS chipset and helps to coordinate connections between the A-GPS chipset and the Assistance Server. Introduced into the network maintained by the service provider is a verification server running an application identification engine which determines if the request for preliminary location information engendered by the requesting application is approved.

Claims

1. A method for authorizing a requesting application to access a positioning technology resident on a mobile network device, the method comprising:

opening a session on a mobile communications network;

passing a plurality of credentials of the requesting application to a verification server via the session; and

allowing the requesting application to access the positioning technology once the verification server approves the requesting application based on the plurality of credentials.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the positioning technology is an A-GPS chipset.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising passing a preliminary location information query to an Assistance Server.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising providing, from the Assistance Server, preliminary location information to the A-GPS chipset.

5. The method of claim 3, further comprising verifying, from a session ID checking logic running on the verification server, a plurality of session ID information from the session over which the plurality of credentials of the requesting application are passed to it for equivalency to a plurality of session ID information from the session over which the preliminary location query is passed to the Assistance Server.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising notifying a user of the mobile network device of an unauthorized attempt to access the positioning technology once the verification server denies the requesting application based on the plurality of credentials.

7. A mobile network device comprising:

a housing;

a positioning technology coupled to the housing;

a positioning technology agent running on the mobile network device in communication with the positioning technology and a verification server;

wherein the positioning technology agent

opens a session on a mobile communications network,

passes a plurality of credentials from a requesting application to the verification server, and

allows the requesting application to make a dip to the positioning technology once the verification server approves the requesting application based on the credentials.

8. The mobile network device of claim 7, wherein the positioning technology is an A-GPS chipset.

9. The mobile network device of claim 8, wherein the A-GPS chipset determines a location of the mobile network device using a plurality of preliminary location information from an Assistance Server.

10. The mobile network device of claim 9, wherein the Assistance Server provides the preliminary location information to the A-GPS chipset once the verification server approves the requesting application based on the credentials.

11. The mobile network device of claim 10, wherein a GPS security application running on the mobile network device generates a notification to a user of the mobile network device once the verification server denies a requesting application access to the A-GPS chipset.

12. A system which authorizes a requesting application running on a mobile network device to access a positioning technology resident on the mobile network device, the system comprising:

a mobile communications network to which the mobile network device is attached;

a verification server in communication with the mobile network device via the mobile communications network;

wherein the requesting application transmits a plurality of credentials of the requesting application to the verification server and accesses the positioning technology once the verification server grants the requesting application access based on the plurality of credentials.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the positioning technology is an A-GPS chipset.

14. The system of claim 12, further comprising an Assistance Server in communication with the mobile network device over the mobile communications network.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the mobile network device passes, to the Assistance Server, a request for preliminary location information once the verification server grants the requesting application access to the A-GPS chipset based on the plurality of credentials.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the request for preliminary location information and the transmission of the credentials to the verification server occur during the same session.

17. The system of claim 16, further comprising a session ID checking logic running on the verification server.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the session ID checking logic verifies a plurality of session ID information of the request for preliminary location information for equivalency to a plurality of session ID information of the transmission of the plurality of credentials of the requesting application before the verification server grants the requesting application access to the A-GPS chipset.