Method for personal computer-based home surveillance
First Claim
1. In a personal computer-based home security system implemented as a software program that runs on commercially available personal computers that include a modem, a microphone, and a video camera, a method for monitoring an environment to detect and remedy unusual circumstances that occur in the environment, the method comprising:
- sampling data collected by the microphone and video camera to detect threshold events that represent a change in the environment;
detecting threshold events that represent a change in the environment;
conducting a close surveillance following the detection of a threshold event by more frequently sampling data collected by the microphone and video camera in order to detect, characterize, and record events that represent differences between the sampled data and data normally collected from the environment;
using data patterns that define and categorize types of events;
during close surveillance, monitoring and recording audio data input from the microphone and video data input from the video camera, detecting differences in the input data from expected background, comparing the detected differences with input patterns to determine the type of event that produced the differences, and computing a metric that describes a suspicion level corresponding to the detected events; and
when the close surveillance component has detected sufficient events, initiating an appropriate remedial action.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A PC-based home security system for monitoring the environment surrounding a PC in order to detect suspicious or uncharacteristic events. The PC-based home security system first monitors the environment, listening and watching for a threshold event. When a threshold event is detected, the PC-based home security system then conducts close surveillance of the environment in order to detect and characterize additional events. When the accumulated detected events exceed some threshold value, the PC-based home security system determines that a suspicious or uncharacteristic set of events has occurred, diagnoses those events, and takes a remedial action appropriate to the diagnosed set of suspicious circumstances.
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Citations
54 Claims
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1. In a personal computer-based home security system implemented as a software program that runs on commercially available personal computers that include a modem, a microphone, and a video camera, a method for monitoring an environment to detect and remedy unusual circumstances that occur in the environment, the method comprising:
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sampling data collected by the microphone and video camera to detect threshold events that represent a change in the environment; detecting threshold events that represent a change in the environment; conducting a close surveillance following the detection of a threshold event by more frequently sampling data collected by the microphone and video camera in order to detect, characterize, and record events that represent differences between the sampled data and data normally collected from the environment; using data patterns that define and categorize types of events; during close surveillance, monitoring and recording audio data input from the microphone and video data input from the video camera, detecting differences in the input data from expected background, comparing the detected differences with input patterns to determine the type of event that produced the differences, and computing a metric that describes a suspicion level corresponding to the detected events; and when the close surveillance component has detected sufficient events, initiating an appropriate remedial action. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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21. In a personal computer-based home security system implemented as a software program that runs on commercially available personal computers that include a modem and a microphone, a method for monitoring an environment to detect and remedy unusual circumstances that occur in the environment, the method comprising:
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sampling data collected by the microphone to detect threshold events that represent a change in the environment; detecting threshold events that represent a change in the environment; conducting a close surveillance following the detection of a threshold event by more frequently sampling data collected by the microphone in order to detect, characterize, and record events that represent differences between the sampled data and data normally collected from the environment; using data patterns that define and categorize types of events; during close surveillance, monitoring and recording audio data input from the microphone, detecting differences in the input data from expected background, comparing the detected differences with input patterns to determine the type of event that produced the differences, and computing a metric that describes a suspicion level corresponding to the detected events, the computed metric being a sum of the number of different events detected by the close surveillance component; and when the close surveillance component has detected sufficient events, initiating an appropriate remedial action. - View Dependent Claims (22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35)
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36. In a personal computer-based home security system implemented as a software program that runs on commercially available personal computers that include a modem and a video camera, a method for monitoring an environment to detect and remedy unusual circumstances that occur in the environment, the method comprising:
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sampling data collected by the video camera to detect threshold events that represent a change in the environment; detecting threshold events that represent a change in the environment; conducting a close surveillance following the detection of a threshold event by more frequently sampling data collected by the video camera in order to detect, characterize, and record events that represent differences between the sampled data and data normally collected from the environment; using data patterns that define and categorize types of events; during close surveillance, monitoring and recording video data input from the video camera, detecting differences in the input data from expected background, comparing the detected differences with input patterns to determine the type of event that produced the differences, and computing a metric that describes a suspicion level corresponding to the detected events; and when the close surveillance component has detected sufficient events, initiating an appropriate remedial action. - View Dependent Claims (37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54)
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Specification