Supervising user interaction with online services

• US 7,640,336 B1
• Filed: 12/30/2002
• Issued: 12/29/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 12/30/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Meta Platforms, Inc. (f/k/a Facebook, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AOL LLC (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Crowley, John, Lu, Larry L., O'Laughlen, Eric
• Primary Examiner(s): England; David E
• Application Number:
  US10/330,561
• Time in Patent Office: 2,556 Days
• Field of Search: 709/224, 709/225, 709/229, 709/223, 709/203, 709/218, 709/204, 709/206, 715/500, 715/743, 715/739, 726/7, 726/22, 707/9, 707/104.1
• US Class Current: 709/224
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/06 Generation of reports
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/212 using filtering or selective blocking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/216 Handling conversation history, e.g. grouping of messages in sessions or threads
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/52 for supporting social networking services

Abstract

A report card provides a supervisor or master account holder (e.g., a parent) with information about the activities of an individual or sub-account user (e.g., a child). For example, the report card may include a list of sites (e.g., content identifiers and/or uniform resource locators) that an individual has visited or attempted to visit. Other information (e.g., e-mail and address book activity and instant messaging and contact list activity) also may be provided in addition to tools that allow the master account holder to access information about the activities and to adjust parental controls for the activities.

Claims

1. A guardian system comprising:

one or more hosts to collect activity data regarding activities of a sub-account over which a master account exercises control, and to generate a report card based on the collected sub-account activity data; and

an interface to provide access to the report card to the master account, wherein the report card includes;

an attempted access window including an activity list having one or more identifiers associated with web sites that the sub-account attempted to access and that were blocked by the one or more hosts, with one or more of the identifiers being selectable to enable viewing of the web sites associated with the identifiers, and

one or more inputs by which the master account recommends granting or denying access to the at least one web site, wherein the one or more hosts grants access to the web site when a number of recommendations of multiple master account holders for the web site exceeds a predetermined threshold or denies access to the web site when a number of recommendations of multiple master account holders for the web site exceeds a predetermined threshold.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the report card includes one or more windows to display activity lists indicating online activity on a host network by the sub-account.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the report card includes a web access window including a web access activity list having one or more identifiers associated with web sites that were accessed by the sub-account, with one or more of the identifiers being selectable to enable viewing of a web site associated with a selected identifier.

4. The system of claim 1 wherein the report card includes a parental controls window listing one or more services for which parental controls are applied and an indication of the level of access by the sub-account to the services.

5. The system of claim 4 wherein the parental controls window includes an input to allow editing of parental control settings associated with the sub-account.

6. The system of claim 1 wherein enabling the sub-account access to a particular web site by the master account is further based on a list of recommended sites.

7. The guardian system of claim 1 further comprising an instant messaging window including information regarding instant message activity associated with the sub-account, or an e-mail window including information regarding e-mail activity associated with the sub-account.

8. The system of claim 7 wherein the report card indicates online activity of one or more of web access activity, the instant messaging activity, and the e-mail activity by the sub-account.

9. The system of claim 7 wherein the instant messaging window includes an input interface to enable access to a contact list associated with the sub-account.

10. The system of claim 7 wherein the information includes an indication of changes to a contact list.

11. The system of claim 7 wherein the information includes identifiers of one or more identities that received an instant message from the sub-account or sent an instant message to the sub-account.

12. The system of claim 7 wherein the e-mail window includes an input interface to enable access to a user address book associated with the sub-account.

13. The system of claim 7 wherein the information includes an indication of changes to an address book associated with the sub-account.

14. The system of claim 7 wherein the information includes an identification of one or more identities that received an e-mail from the sub-account or sent an e-mail to the sub-account.

19. The method of claim 1 wherein generating the report card further includes generating an input interface to enable the master account to block future access by the sub-account to one or more web sites associated with the identifiers on the web access activity list.

15. A method for enabling a master account to monitor online activity of a sub-account, the method comprising:

designating a sub-account to be monitored, wherein a master account exercises control over the sub-account;

collecting data representing the online activity of the sub-account;

generating a report card of the online activity corresponding to the collected data, wherein generating the report card includes;

generating an attempted access window including an activity list having one or more identifiers associated with web sites that the designated sub-account attempted to access and that were blocked by one or more hosts, with one or more of the identifiers being selectable to enable viewing of a web site associated with a selected identifier, and

providing one or more inputs by which the master account recommends granting or denying access to at least one web site, wherein the one or more hosts grants access to the web site when a number of recommendations of multiple master account holders for the web site exceeds a predetermined threshold or denies access to the web site when a number of recommendations of multiple master account holders for the web site exceeds a predetermined threshold; and

making the report card available to the master account.

16. The method of claim 15 wherein designating the sub-account further comprises receiving an input from the master account identifying the sub-account to be monitored.

17. The method of claim 15 wherein collecting the data representing the online activity includes collecting the data related to web content accessed by the sub-account.

18. The method of claim 15 wherein collecting the data representing the online activity includes collecting the data corresponding to attempts by the sub-account to access web content.

20. The method of claim 15 wherein generating the report card further includes generating a parental controls window listing one or more services for which parental controls are applied and an indication of the level of access by the sub-account to the services.

21. The method of claim 20 wherein generating the parental controls window includes generating an input to edit parental control settings of the sub-account.

22. The method of claim 15 wherein enabling the master account access to a particular web site by the sub-account is further based on a list of recommended sites.

23. The method of claim 15 further comprising an instant messaging window including information regarding instant message activity associated with the sub-account, or an e-mail window including information regarding e-mail activity associated with the sub-account.

24. The method of claim 23 wherein collecting the data representing the online activity includes collecting the data corresponding to the e-mail activity associated with the sub-account.

25. The method of claim 23 wherein collecting the data representing the online activity includes collecting the data corresponding to the instant message activity associated with the sub-account.

26. The method of claim 23 wherein collecting the data representing the online activity includes collecting the data relating to more than one of web access attempts, the instant messaging activity, and the e-mail activity.

27. The method of claim 23 wherein generating the report card further includes generating an input interface to enable access to a contact list associated with the sub-account.

28. The method of claim 23 wherein generating the report card further includes generating a report that includes an indication of changes to a contact list.

29. The method of claim 23 wherein generating the report card further includes generating a report that includes identifications of one or more identities that received an instant message from the sub-account or sent an instant message to the sub-account.

30. The method of claim 23 wherein generating the report card further includes generating a report that includes an input interface to enable access to a user address book associated with the sub-account.

31. The method of claim 30 wherein generating the report card further includes generating information that includes an indication of changes to the address book.

32. The method of claim 23 wherein generating the report card further includes identifying one or more identities that received an e-mail from the sub-account or sent an e-mail to the sub-account.

33. A graphical user interface for enabling supervision of an online account, the graphical user interface comprising a report card including one or more report card windows, with at least one report card window including:

a first interface that displays an activity list representing online activity by the online account, and

a mechanism to enable a supervisory viewer of the report card to select the online activity from the activity list to access information associated with the selected online activity, wherein the one or more report card windows includes;

an attempted access window including an attempted activity list having one or more identifiers associated with web sites that the online account attempted to access and that were blocked by one or more host, with one or more of the identifiers being selectable to enable viewing of the web sites associated with the identifiers on the attempted activity list, and

one or more inputs by which the supervisory viewer recommends granting or denying access to at least one web site, wherein the one or more hosts grants sub-account access to the web site when a number of recommendations of multiple master account holders for the web site exceeds a predetermined threshold or denies sub-account access to the web site when a number of recommendations of multiple master account holders for the web site exceeds a predetermined threshold.

34. The graphical user interface of claim 33 wherein the online activity is one of web access, instant messaging, and e-mail.

35. The graphical user interface of claim 33 wherein the web access window includes an input interface to enable blocking of future access by the online account to one or more web sites associated with the identifiers on the web access activity list.

36. The graphical user interface of claim 33 wherein the report card includes a parental controls window listing one or more services for which parental controls are applied and an indication of the level of access by the online account to the services.

37. The graphical user interface of claim 36 wherein the parental controls window includes an input to edit parental control settings associated with the online account.

38. The graphical user interface of claim 33 wherein enabling the online account access to a particular web site is further based on a list of recommended sites.

39. The graphical user interface of claim 33 further comprising an instant messaging window including information regarding instant message activity associated with the sub-account, or an e-mail window including information regarding e-mail activity associated with the sub-account.

40. The graphical user interface of claim 39 wherein the instant messaging window includes an input interface to enable access to a contact list associated with the online account.

41. The graphical user interface of claim 39 wherein the information regarding the instant message activity of the online account includes an indication of changes to a contact list.

42. The graphical user interface of claim 39 wherein the information regarding the instant message activity of the online account includes identifications of one or more identities that received an instant message from the online account or sent an instant message to the online account.

43. The graphical user interface of claim 39 wherein the e-mail window includes an input interface to enable access to a user address book associated with the online account.

44. The graphical user interface of claim 39 wherein the information regarding the e-mail activity of the online account includes an indication of changes to an address book associated with the online account.

45. The graphical user interface of claim 39 wherein the information regarding the e-mail activity of the online account includes an identification of one or more identities that received an e-mail from the online account or sent an e-mail to the online account.

46. A parental control system comprising:

a server system structured and configured to;

gather data related to online activities of a secondary account over which a primary account exercises control; and

generate an online report based on the gathered data, wherein the on-line report includes;

an attempted access section which provides a list of selectable online Links to web sites that the secondary account attempted to access and that were blocked by the parental control system, and

one or more inputs by which the primary account provides a positive or negative recommendation for a web site, wherein the parental control system grants or denies access to the web site when a number of positive or negative recommendations of multiple primary account holders for the web site exceeds a predetermined threshold.

47. The system of claim 46 wherein the on-line report includes a parental controls window listing one or more services for which parental controls are applied and an indication of the level of access by the secondary account to the services.

48. The system of claim 47 wherein the parental controls window includes an input to allow editing of parental control settings associated with the secondary account.