USER LOCATION TRACKING

• US 20150296032A1
• Filed: 01/15/2015
• Published: 10/15/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 04/11/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ACR Development, Inc.
• Original Assignee: ACR Development, Inc.
• Inventors: Roman, Anthony Christopher, Hammond, Michael P. Jr., Rose, Douglas J.
• Granted Patent: US 9,313,618 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06311 Scheduling, planning or task assignment for a person or group
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/063114 Status monitoring or status determination for a person or group
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/10 Active monitoring, e.g. heartbeat, ping or trace-route
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/107 wherein the security policies are location-dependent, e.g. entities privileges depend on current location or allowing specific operations only from locally connected terminals
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/027 using movement velocity, acceleration information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services

Abstract

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for receiving information from a remote system comprising one or more time periods during which a location of the client device can be tracked and monitoring the location of the client device during each of the time periods by obtaining a plurality of location coordinates from the client device during the time period and persistently storing the location coordinates on the client device.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

performing the following by a client device;

configuring the client device to track the geographic location of the client device;

tracking the location of the client device by obtaining a plurality of location coordinates of the client device over time and persistently storing the location coordinates on the client device; and

detecting that a user has disabled the location tracking on the client device and, in response, locking the client device.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving, by the client device, information from a remote system comprising one or more time periods during which the location of the client device can be tracked.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein tracking the location of the client device further comprises tracking, by the client device, the location of the client device by obtaining the plurality of location coordinates during the time periods.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein detecting that the user has disabled the location tracking further comprises sending a notification of such to a remote system.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein obtaining the plurality of location coordinates does not require a transmitter of the client device to be enabled.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

sending the stored location coordinates to a remote system at times when a transmitter of the client device is enabled.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein tracking the location of the client device by obtaining a plurality of location coordinates of the client device over time comprises:

obtaining fewer location coordinates at times when the client device is traveling in a substantially straight line or at slow speeds.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining that during a first period of time the client device is in a same location and, based thereon, combining multiple location coordinates for the first period of time into a single location coordinate.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein configuring the client device to track the geographic location of the client device over time further comprises configuring the tracking so that the tracking cannot be terminated by the user of the client device.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein locking the client device comprises changing a password for the client device.

11. A system comprising:

data processing apparatus programmed to perform operations comprising;

configuring the client device to track the geographic location of the client device;

tracking the location of the client device by obtaining a plurality of location coordinates of the client device over time and persistently storing the location coordinates on the client device; and

detecting that a user has disabled the location tracking on the client device and, in response, locking the client device.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the operations further comprise:

receiving, by the client device, information from a remote system comprising one or more time periods during which the location of the client device can be tracked.

13. The system of claim 12 wherein tracking the location of the client device further comprises:

tracking, by the client device, the location of the client device by obtaining the plurality of location coordinates during the time periods.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein detecting that the user has disabled the location tracking further comprises sending a notification of such to a remote system.

15. The system of claim 11 wherein obtaining the plurality of location coordinates does not require a transmitter of the client device to be enabled.

16. The system of claim 11, wherein the operations further comprise:

sending the stored location coordinates to a remote system at times when a transmitter of the client device is enabled.

17. The system of claim 11 wherein tracking the location of the client device by obtaining a plurality of location coordinates of the client device over time comprises:

obtaining fewer location coordinates at times when the client device is traveling in a substantially straight line or at slow speeds.

18. The system of claim 11, wherein the operations further comprise:

determining that during a first period of time the client device is in a same location and, based thereon, combining multiple location coordinates for the first period of time into a single location coordinate.

19. The system of claim 11 wherein configuring the client device to track the geographic location of the client device over time further comprises configuring the tracking so that the tracking cannot be terminated by the user of the client device.

20. The system of claim 11 wherein locking the client device comprises changing a password for the client device.

21. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon that, when executed by data processing apparatus, cause the data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising:

configuring the client device to track the geographic location of the client device;

tracking the location of the client device by obtaining a plurality of location coordinates of the client device over time and persistently storing the location coordinates on the client device; and

detecting that a user has disabled the location tracking on the client device and, in response, locking the client device.

22. The computer-readable medium of claim 21, wherein the operations further comprise:

receiving, by the client device, information from a remote computer-readable medium comprising one or more time periods during which the location of the client device can be tracked.

23. The computer-readable medium of claim 22 wherein tracking the location of the client device further comprises:

tracking, by the client device, the location of the client device by obtaining the plurality of location coordinates during the time periods.

24. The computer-readable medium of claim 21, wherein detecting that the user has disabled the location tracking further comprises sending a notification of such to a remote computer-readable medium.

25. The computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein obtaining the plurality of location coordinates does not require a transmitter of the client device to be enabled.

26. The computer-readable medium of claim 21, wherein the operations further comprise:

sending the stored location coordinates to a remote computer-readable medium at times when a transmitter of the client device is enabled.

27. The computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein tracking the location of the client device by obtaining a plurality of location coordinates of the client device over time comprises:

obtaining fewer location coordinates at times when the client device is traveling in a substantially straight line or at slow speeds.

28. The computer-readable medium of claim 21, wherein the operations further comprise:

determining that during a first period of time the client device is in a same location and, based thereon, combining multiple location coordinates for the first period of time into a single location coordinate.

29. The computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein configuring the client device to track the geographic location of the client device over time further comprises configuring the tracking so that the tracking cannot be terminated by the user of the client device.

30. The computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein locking the client device comprises changing a password for the client device.