Premises aware security

• US 9,536,057 B2
• Filed: 10/18/2013
• Issued: 01/03/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 10/19/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Musarubra US LLC (Musarubra US SellCo LLC)
• Original Assignee: McAfee, Inc. (McAfee, LLC)
• Inventors: Das, Sudeep, Sharma, Pramod, Vashisth, Sumant
• Primary Examiner(s): Zecher, Dede
• Assistant Examiner(s): Doan, Trang
• Application Number:
  US14/126,707
• Publication Number:
  US 20140351881A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,173 Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/56 Computer malware detection or handling, e.g. anti-virus arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/629 to features or functions of an application
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/2111 Location-sensitive, e.g. geographical location, GPS
• 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: H04W 12/086 using security domains
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/088 using filters or firewalls
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/50 Service provisioning or reconfiguring
• 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

Abstract

Premise-based policies can be applied in the management of mobile devices and other computing devices within a system. A computing device is detected using close proximity wireless communication and location information is sent to the computing device using close proximity wireless communication. Policies applied to the computing device can be based at least in part on the location information.

Claims

1. At least one non-transitory machine accessible storage medium having instructions stored thereon, the instructions when executed on a machine, cause the machine to:

receive, at a computing device, a near field wireless signal indicating a location identifier for to the computing device, wherein the near field wireless signal is received as the computing device enters a gate of the particular portion of the premises and the location identifier identifies that the computing device has entered a gate of a particular portion of a premises, and the particular portion comprises a particular one of a plurality of floors of a building;

send a request, over a network, to a policy server system, for policy information corresponding to the particular portion of the premises, wherein the request identifies the location identifier and describes attributes of the computing device;

receive the policy information from the policy server, wherein the policy information identifies at least one policy corresponding to the particular portion of the premises and is to be use by a security software agent installed on the computing device to apply the at least one policy to the computing device; and

cause the at least one policy to be applied to the computing device while the computing device is on the particular portion of the premises, wherein a different policy is to be applied in another portion of the premises comprising a different one of the plurality of floors.

2. The at least one storage medium of claim 1, wherein the signal is received from a wireless non-contact writer.

3. The at least one storage medium of claim 1, wherein the signal is received at a wireless non-contact device on the computing device.

4. The at least one storage medium of claim 3, wherein the wireless non-contact device includes a non-volatile memory with an antenna and the location identifier is written to the non-volatile memory.

5. The at least one storage medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions when executed, further cause the machine to determine, based at least in part on the received location identifier, that the computing device enters the particular portion of the premises corresponding to the location identifier.

6. The at least one storage medium of claim 5, wherein the instructions when executed, further cause the machine to receive another near field wireless signal to erase the location identifier from the computing device, wherein the other near field wireless signal corresponds to the computing device exiting a gate of the particular portion of the premises.

7. The at least one storage medium of claim 6, wherein the at least one policy corresponds to the particular portion of the premises and determining that the computing device exits the particular portion of the premises causes application of the at least one policy at the computing device to be discontinued.

8. A method comprising:

receiving, using near field wireless communication, a location identifier corresponding to a computing device at a particular portion of a premises, wherein the location identifier is received as the computing device enters a gate of the particular portion of the premises and identifies that the computing device has entered the particular portion of the premises, wherein the particular portion comprises a particular one of a plurality of floors of a building;

sending a request, over a network, from the computing device to a policy server system, for policy information corresponding to the premises, wherein the request identifies the location identifier and includes information describing attributes of the computing device;

receiving the policy information from the policy server, wherein the policy information identifies at least one policy corresponding to the particular portion of the premises and the policy information is received at the computing device to be used by a security software agent installed on the computing device to apply the at least one policy to the computing device, wherein a different policy is to be applied in another portion of the premises comprising a different one of the plurality of floors; and

causing the at least one policy to be applied to the computing device while the computing device is within the particular portion of the premises.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the near field wireless communication comprises at least one of near field communication (NFC), radio frequency identification (RFID), and Bluetooth communications.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein the at least one policy is further based on a user profile associated with the computing device.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein the attributes include global positioning system (GPS) location information for the computing device generated by a GPS sensor local to the computing device to corroborate location of the computing device.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein the attributes include a device identifier associated with a registration of the device corresponding to the policy server.

13. A system comprising:

a computing device comprising;

a wireless non-contact reader to receive a location identifier at a gate of a particular portion of a premises, wherein the location identifier identifies that the computing device has entered the particular portion of the premises, and the particular portion comprises a particular one of a plurality of floors of a building; and

a policy agent to;

send a request, to a policy server, for policy information corresponding to the premises, wherein the request identifies the location identifier and includes information describing attributes of the computing device;

receive the policy information from the policy server, wherein the policy information identifies at least one policy corresponding to the particular portion of the premises; and

use the policy information to apply the at least one policy to the computing device while the computing device is within the particular portion of the premises, wherein a different policy is to be applied in another portion of the premises comprising a different one of the plurality of floors.

14. The system of claim 13,

wherein the policy agent uses the policy information to apply the at least one policy to the computing device by configuring applications on the computing device based at least in part on the particular policy.

15. The system of claim 13, further comprising the policy server, wherein the policy server hosts a set of policies associated with a set of locations, and the set of policies comprises the at least one policy.

16. The system of claim 13, further comprising a wireless non-contact writer configured to transmit the location identifier to the computing device over a near field wireless communication channel, wherein the wireless non-contact reader receives the location identifier from the wireless non-contact writer.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the wireless non-contact writer is located at the gate.

18. The system of claim 13, wherein the computing device comprises a mobile computing device.