Method and apparatus for analysis of user traffic within a predefined area

• US 9,438,677 B2
• Filed: 04/15/2014
• Issued: 09/06/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 08/24/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: WeWork Companies, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Euclid Chemical Company (RPM International Incorporated)
• Inventors: Leung, Kenneth Man-Kin, Smith, William Tolbert, Wilhelm, Steve Lawrence
• Primary Examiner(s): Ton, Dang
• Assistant Examiner(s): Aung, Sai
• Application Number:
  US14/253,787
• Publication Number:
  US 20140229616A1
• Time in Patent Office: 875 Days
• Field of Search: 370/252, 370/310, 370/389
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 11/06 using intensity measurements
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 3/023 Monitoring or calibrating
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/0009 Transmission of position information to remote stations involving assistance data G01S5/0236
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/0284 Relative positioning
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/0294 Trajectory determination or predictive filtering, e.g. target tracking or Kalman filtering
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/063 Operations research, analysis or management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/40 Business processes related to the transportation industry shipping G06Q10/083
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/318 Received signal strength
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/373 Predicting channel quality or other radio frequency [RF] parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0428 wherein the data content is protected, e.g. by encrypting or encapsulating the payload
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/303 Terminal profiles
• 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 12/02 Protecting privacy or anonymity, e.g. protecting personally identifiable information [PII]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/71 Hardware identity
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/021 Services related to particular areas, e.g. point of interest [POI] services, venue services or geofences
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/023 using mutual or relative location information between multiple location based services [LBS] targets or of distance thresholds
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/025 using location based information parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/38 for collecting sensor information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/80 : Services using short range communication, e.g. near-field communication [NFC], radio-frequency identification [RFID] or low energy communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 64/00 : Locating users or terminals or network equipment for network management purposes, e.g. mobility management

Abstract

Multiple packets are received that were transmitted by multiple mobile electronic device sensors located in a predefined area. The packets each include data detected by the sensors of multiple mobile electronic devices. At least a portion of the collected data is stored including multiple unique device identifiers that belong to multiple mobile electronic devices. Responsive to determining that at least two of the unique device identifiers are sequential, a set of values based on the at least two unique devices identifiers are associated as belonging to a same one of the mobile electronic devices.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

receiving a set of packets from at least one mobile electronic device sensor located in a predefined area, wherein the set of packets includes data detected by the at least one sensor of at least a first mobile electronic device;

storing at least a portion of the data that is included in the set of packets as a stored portion of data, wherein the stored portion of data includes a plurality of unique device identifiers that belong to the first mobile electronic device;

determining that at least two of the unique device identifiers are sequential;

responsive to determining that at least two of the unique device identifiers are sequential, associating a set of values based on the at least two unique device identifiers as belonging to a same first mobile electronic device;

determining a set of one or more device locations that the first mobile electronic device has been based at least in part on the data detected by the at least one sensor for the at least two unique device identifiers; and

assigning attribute information to a device profile based on demographic data of a set of one or more physical locations that correlate to the set of device locations, wherein the device profile is created for the first mobile electronic device.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the stored portion of data further includes detection times of the at least one mobile electronic device, and wherein prior to associating the at least two unique device identifiers, determining that the at least two unique device identifiers were detected within a predefined period of time.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the set of values includes encrypted versions of the at least two unique device identifiers.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein associating the at least two unique device identifiers includes performing the following:

encrypting each of the at least two unique device identifiers; and

associating each of the at least two encrypted unique device identifiers as belonging to the first mobile electronic device.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

storing those unique identifiers in fall the device profile.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one sensor is selected from the group consisting of a WiFi detector, a Bluetooth receiver, and a Radio Frequency (RF) receiver.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the mobile electronic device is selected from the group consisting of a WiFi enabled device, a cellular phone, and a Bluetooth enabled device.

8. An apparatus in a data processing center, comprising:

a set of one or more processors;

a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium that stores instructions, that when executed by the set of processors, cause the set of processors to perform the following;

receive a set of packets from at least one mobile electronic device sensor located in a predefined area, wherein the set of packets includes data detected by the at least one sensor of at least a first mobile electronic device;

store at least a portion of the data that is included in the set of packets as a stored portion of data wherein the stored portion of data includes a plurality of unique device identifiers that belong to the first mobile electronic device;

determine that at least two of the unique device identifiers are sequential;

responsive to a determination that at least two of the unique device identifiers are sequential, associate a set of values based on the at least two unique device identifiers as belonging to a same first mobile electronic device;

determine a set of one or more device locations that he first mobile electronic device has been based at least in part on the data detected by the at least one sensor for the at least two unique device identifiers; and

assign attribute information to a device profile based on demographic data of a set of one or more physical locations that correlate to the set of device locations, wherein the device profile is created for the first mobile electronic device.

9. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the stored portion of data further includes detection times of the at least one mobile electronic device, and wherein prior to an association of the at least two unique device identifiers, the set of processors are further to determine that the at least two unique device identifiers were detected within a predefined period of time.

10. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the set of values includes encrypted versions of the at least two unique device identifiers.

11. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the set of processors is configured to associate the at least two unique device identifiers by performing the following:

encrypting each of the at least two unique device identifiers; and

associating each of the at least two encrypted unique device identifiers as belonging to the first mobile electronic device.

12. The apparatus of claim 8, further comprising instructions that when executed by the set of processors, cause the set of processors to store those unique identifiers in the device profile.

13. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the at least one sensor is selected from the group consisting of a WiFi detector, a Bluetooth receiver, and a Radio Frequency (RF) receiver.

14. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the mobile electronic device is selected from the group consisting of a WiFi enabled device, a cellular phone, and a Bluetooth enabled device.