VOICE-BASED TELECOMMUNICATION LOGIN

• US 20130006626A1
• Filed: 06/29/2011
• Published: 01/03/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 06/29/2011
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Aiyer, Chandrasekara, Bennet, Brent W., Carey, Elizabeth J., Li, Chuanfeng, Mansoor, Faisal, Russell, Duncan E., Sharma, Aditi
• Application Number:
  US13/171,765
• Publication Number:
  US 20130006626A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/235
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/32 using biometric data, e.g. fingerprints, iris scans or voiceprints
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 13/00 Speech synthesis; Text to speech systems
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/26 Speech to text systems G10L15/08 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 17/24 the user being prompted to utter a password or a predefined phrase
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0861 using biometrical features, e.g. fingerprint, retina-scan cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication using biological data H04L9/3231
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2201/405 involving speaker-dependent recognition
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/38 Graded-service arrangements, i.e. some subscribers prevented from establishing certain connections queuing arrangements H04Q3/64
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/0078 Security; Fraud detection; Fraud prevention

Abstract

A voice-based telecommunications login system which includes a login process controller; a speech recognition module; a speaker verification module; a speech synthesis module; and a user database. Responsive to a user-provided first verbal answer to a first verbal question, the first verbal answer is converted to text and compared with data previously stored in the user database. The speech synthesis module provides a second question to the user, and responsive to a user-provided second verbal answer to the second question, the speaker verification module compares the second verbal answer with a voice print of the user previously stored in the user database and validates that the second verbal answer matches a voice print of the user previously stored in the user database. Also disclosed is a method of logging in to the telecommunications system and a computer program product for logging in to the telecommunications system.

Claims

1. A voice-based telecommunications login system comprising:

a login process controller to run login process instances and other modules of the login system;

a speech recognition module to receive, recognize and transform a user'"'"'s voice to text;

a speaker verification module to verify the user'"'"'s identity based on verbal dialogue from the user;

a speech synthesis module to synthesize a voice to provide verbal dialogue to the user; and

a user database to store voice prints of the user;

wherein, in operation, responsive to a user-provided first verbal answer to a first verbal question generated by the login system, the first verbal answer is converted by the speech recognition module to text and compared with data previously stored in the user database, the speech synthesis module providing at least one second question to the user, and responsive to a user-provided second verbal answer to the at least one second question, the speaker verification module comparing the second verbal answer with a voice print of the user previously stored in the user database and validating that the second verbal answer matches the voice print of the user previously stored in the user database; and

wherein the login system is implemented in one or more computing devices.

2. The login system of claim 1 further comprising a question generator for randomly generating questions such that the randomly generated question must be analyzed by the user to give a correct answer wherein, in operation, the randomly generated question is provided to the speech synthesis module as the at least one second question.

3. The login system of claim 2 wherein the randomly generated question is an arithmetic question.

4. The login system of claim 2 wherein the randomly generated question is only an arithmetic question.

6. The login system of claim 1 wherein the at least second question is a fixed question such that the fixed question and an answer to the fixed question were previously stored in the user database.

7. The login system of claim 6 wherein the user database further contains user-provided verbal answers to the fixed questions

8. The login system of claim 1 is a voice-based login system to temporarily configure a telecommunications device as the user'"'"'s telecommunications device.

9. The login system of claim 1 wherein the speaker verification module uses text dependent speaker recognition.

5. The login system of 3 wherein the user database further contains user-provided voice snippets of digits 0 to 9.

10. A method of logging in to a telecommunications system using a login system comprising:

providing a first verbal question to a user;

responsive to a user-provided first verbal answer to the first verbal question, comparing the first verbal answer with data previously stored by the login system;

generating at least one second verbal question after confirming a match between the first verbal answer and the data previously stored by the login system;

responsive to a user-provided second verbal answer to the at least one second verbal question, comparing the second verbal answer with a voice print of the user previously stored by the login system; and

providing access to the telecommunications system if the second verbal answer matches the voice print of the user previously stored by the login system;

wherein the method is performed by one or more computing devices.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein generating the at least one second verbal question comprises randomly generating the at least one second question such that the randomly generated question must be analyzed by the user to give a correct answer.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein the randomly generated question is an arithmetic question.

13. The method of claim 11 wherein the randomly generated question is only an arithmetic question.

14. The method of claim 10 wherein generating a second verbal question comprises generating a fixed question such that the fixed question and an answer to the fixed question were previously stored in the login system.

15. The method of claim 10 wherein generating the at least one second verbal question comprises randomly generating the at least one second question such that the randomly generated question must be analyzed by the user to give a correct answer and further comprising:

generating a third verbal question such that the fixed question and an answer to the fixed question were previously stored in the login system;

responsive to a user-provided third verbal answer to the third verbal question, comparing the third verbal answer with a voice print of the user previously stored by the login system; and

wherein providing access to the telecommunications system comprises providing access to the telecommunications system if the second and third verbal answers match the voice prints of the user previously stored by the login system.

16. The method of claim 15 wherein the randomly generated question is only an arithmetic question.

17. The method of claim 10 wherein the method of logging in is voice-based and providing access to the telecommunication system includes temporarily configuring a telecommunication device as the user'"'"'s telecommunication device.

18. The method of claim 10 wherein the first verbal answer is a number of a telephone extension currently being used by the user for which the user requires access to the telecommunications system and further comprising converting the first verbal answer to text and checking the login system to see if the number exists in the login system.

19. A computer program product for logging in to a telecommunications system using a login system, the computer program product comprising:

a computer readable non-transitory storage medium having computer readable program code embodied therewith, the computer readable program code comprising;

computer readable program code configured to provide a first verbal question to a user;

responsive to a user-provided first verbal answer to the first verbal question, computer readable program code configured to compare the first verbal answer with data previously stored by the login system;

computer readable program code configured to generate at least one second verbal question after confirming a match between the first verbal answer and the voice print;

responsive to a user-provided second verbal answer to the at least one second verbal question, computer readable program code configured to compare the second verbal answer with a voice print of the user previously stored by the login system; and

computer readable program code configured to provide access to the telecommunications system if the second verbal answer matches the voice print of the user previously stored by the login system.

20. The computer program product of claim 19 wherein computer readable program code configured to generate the at least one second verbal question comprises computer readable program code configured to randomly generate the at least one second questions such that the randomly generated question must be analyzed by the user to give a correct answer.