Method and system for keyword detection using voice-recognition

• US 7,672,845 B2
• Filed: 06/22/2004
• Issued: 03/02/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 06/22/2004
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Beranek, Michael J., Malinowski, Jason R.
• Primary Examiner(s): Lerner; Martin
• Application Number:
  US10/873,036
• Publication Number:
  US 20050283475A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,079 Days
• Field of Search: 704/251, 704/257, 704/270, 704/270.1, 704/275, 704/276, 707/3, 707/4, 707/5, 379/88.01, 379/88.04, 379/265.09, 379/265.12
• US Class Current: 704/251
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3334 Selection or weighting of terms from queries, including natural language queries
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/26 Speech to text systems G10L15/08 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/088 Word spotting
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/226 using non-speech characteristics
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/228 of application context
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2201/40 using speech recognition speech recognition per se G10L15/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/2281 Call monitoring, e.g. for law enforcement purposes; Call tracing; Detection or prevention of malicious calls
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/42221 Conversation recording systems at the subscriber's set H04M1/656

Abstract

A method and system is provided to monitor speech and detect keywords or phrases in the speech, such as for example, monitored calls in a call center or speakers/presenters using teleprompters, or the like. Upon detection of the keywords of phrases, information associated with the keywords or phrases may be presented to a display device so that a user may dynamically receive new information as context of the speech progresses. This provides dynamic information as the context of the conversation develops. The information may be presented as links, cues, text, or similar formats. The detected keywords or phrases may also be associated with rules that govern the conditions and criteria for processing the detected keyword and presentation of the information.

Claims

1. A method for dynamically detecting topics during one of a speech and a call center conversation, comprising:

predefining one or more keywords;

associating information with the one or more keywords;

detecting at least one of the one or more keywords during the speech or the call center conversation;

after the predefining, the associating and detecting, checking whether one or more rules are associated with the one or more detected keywords;

if so, processing the one or more rules; and

further comprising one of;

during the speech, utilizing an intelligent teleprompter and displaying the detected keywords and the information associated with the keywords and dynamically altering one or more panes of information of the intelligent teleprompter based upon the detected one or more keywords; and

during the call center conversation, displaying the detected keywords and the information associated with the keywords uttered by a caller to a call center agent and displaying an indication that a topic area has been covered by removing or graying out a displayed word.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more rules govern the conditions when the information associated with at least one of the detected keywords may be provided.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more rules control the processing of a call flow sequence.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising monitoring at least any one of a telephone call, an audio input, and a recording as a source of the speech.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the monitoring includes monitoring a call delivered via one of a network, a digital phone line, an analog line, a voice-over-internet protocol (VOIP).

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising building a database indexed by the one or more keywords.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more keywords comprise one or more phrases and the detecting detects the one or more phrases.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

marking the one or more keywords when the one or more keywords has been detected.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more rules includes a profile identifier configured to indicate whether a call center agent has been trained in a subject area.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more rules includes determining a number of incidents of the at least one detected keyword and comparing the number of incidents to a threshold to trigger a subsequent action.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the subsequent action is a presentation of new information to the call center agent.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more rules includes an intelligent system configured to dictate how new information is presented to the call center agent.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more rules includes a demographic check on a caller based on one or more of a caller ID, user ID, and automatic number ID, the demographic check used to queue content for presentation to the call center agent.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of the one or more rules triggers at least one of the one or more rules.

15. The method of claim 1, further comprising comparing the one or more detected keywords to a knowledge database indexed by the keywords, verifying that related information is germane, and displaying the associated information as the one or more keywords are detected.

16. The method of claim 1, further comprising dynamically changing the one or more rules as the information changes, wherein the one or more rules dynamically condition decisions based on a speaker'"'"'s environment.

17. The method of claim 1, wherein the intelligent teleprompter contains one or more panes of information which can be dynamically altered based upon the one or more detected keywords and capturing in audio the conversation.

18. A method for dynamically detecting topics during a speech, comprising:

predefining one or more keywords;

associating information with the one or more keywords;

monitoring a conversation during the speech to detect at least one of the one or more keywords;

checking whether one or more rules are associated with the one or more detected keywords;

if so, processing the one or more rules;

determining whether the one or more rules are satisfied;

if so, extracting the information associated with the one or more keywords; and

during the speech, utilizing an intelligent teleprompter and displaying the information associated with the keywords;

marking displayed keywords of the intelligent teleprompter so as to indicate that subject matter associated with the displayed keywords has been covered; and

dynamically altering one or more panes of information of the intelligent teleprompter based upon the detected one or more keywords.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising during the speech, displaying the detected keywords.

20. A method for dynamically detecting topics at a call center between a caller and a call center agent, comprising:

predefining one or more keywords relevant to a context of a first call center conversation;

associating information with the one or more keywords;

monitoring a second call center conversation to detect at least one of the one or more keywords;

checking whether one or more rules are associated with the one or more detected keywords;

if so, processing the one or more rules;

determining whether the one or more rules are satisfied;

if so, establishing new keywords;

during the second call center conversation, displaying the information associated with the keywords uttered by the caller to the call center agent; and

displaying an indication that a topic area has been covered by graying out a displayed word.

21. The method of claim 20, further comprising during the second call center conversation, displaying the detected keywords.