AGGREGATION AND USE OF INFORMATION RELATING TO A USERS CONTEXT

• US 20090265764A1
• Filed: 04/21/2008
• Published: 10/22/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 04/21/2008
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Verizon Patent and Licensing Incorporated (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Verizon Business Network Services, Inc. (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Inventors: McKEE, Martin W., SCHULTZ, Paul T., SARTINI, Robert A.
• Application Number:
  US12/106,444
• Publication Number:
  US 20090265764A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 726/4
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]

Abstract

Information, called context information, relating to a current state of a user may be aggregated. In one implementation, the context information may include information that is automatically generated by communication devices of the user and information, submitted by the user, that relates to the user'"'"'s state. The context information may be used by authorized context consumers.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

maintaining context information relating to a current state of a user, the context information including;

device presence information that is automatically generated by communication devices associated with the user, and

information, submitted by the user, that relates to the user'"'"'s state;

receiving a request, from a context consumer, for context information relating to the user; and

transmitting the requested context information to the context consumer when the requested context information is determined to be context information that the context consumer is authorized to receive.

2. The method of claim 1, where the device presence information includes an on/off state of the communication devices.

3. The method of claim 1, where the device presence information includes geographic locations corresponding to the devices.

4. The method of claim 1, where context information further includes labeled location information that symbolically defines a location of the user.

5. The method of claim 1, where the context information further includes information describing recent activities of the user.

6. The method of claim 1, where the context information further includes information received from a home subscriber server (HSS).

7. The method of claim 1, where the context information further includes information relating to preferences of the user.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein transmitting the request further includes:

determining whether the context information is to be sent to the context consumer based on a comparison of the context consumer to a user configured list that defines context consumers that are allowed to access the context information of the user.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein different context consumers have different scopes of access rights to the context information of the user.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

transmitting a message to the user requesting verification of a transaction, where at least one of a type of communication channel for the message or a form of the requested verification being determined based on the context information.

11. The method of claim 10, where both the type of the communication channel and the form of the verification are determined based on the context information.

12. The method of claim 10, where the requested verification of the transaction is based on biometric verification.

13. The method of claim 10, where the requested verification of the transaction is a password-based verification.

14. A method comprising:

receiving a request to authorize a transaction relating to a user;

receiving context information relating to a current state of the user;

transmitting a message to the user requesting verification of a transaction, at least one of a type of communication channel for the message or a form of the verification being determined based on the context information.

15. The method of claim 14, further comprising:

receiving a response to the message from the user; and

outputting an indication of whether the transaction is authorized based on the response.

16. The method of claim 14, where both the type of the communication channel and the form of the verification are determined based on the context information.

17. The method of claim 14, where the requested verification of the transaction is based on biometric verification.

18. The method of claim 14, where the requested verification of the transaction is a password-based verification.

19. The method of claim 14, where the context information further includes:

device presence information that is automatically generated by communication devices associated with the user, and

information, submitted by the user, that relates to the user'"'"'s state.

20. The method of claim 19, where the context information further includes:

labeled location information that symbolically defines a location of the user, information describing recent activities of the user, information received from a home subscriber server (HSS), or information relating to preferences of the user.

21. A system comprising:

one or more processors; and

computer readable media coupled to the one or more processors, the computer readable media storing programming instructions for execution by the one or more processors, the programming instructions including;

instructions to maintain context information relating to a current state of a user, the context information including device presence information that is automatically generated by communication devices of the user and information relating to recent activities of the user;

instructions to receive a request for the context information from a context consumer;

instructions to determine whether the context consumer is authorized to receive the requested context information; and

instructions to transmit the requested context information to the context consumer when the context consumer is authorized to receive the requested context information.

22. The system of claim 21, where the computer-readable medium further includes:

instructions to determine, based on the context information, how a transaction relating to the user should be authorized.

23. The system of claim 22, where the computer-readable medium further includes:

instructions to receive authentication information from the user; and

instructions to determine whether to authorize the transaction based on the authentication information.

24. A computer-readable media containing processing instructions, that when executed by one or more processors, cause the processors to:

receive a request to authorize a transaction relating to a user;

retrieve context information relating to a current state of the user;

transmit a message to the user requesting verification of a transaction, at least one of a type of communication channel for the message or a form of the verification being determined based on the context information.

25. The computer-readable media of claim 24, where both the type of the communication channel and the form of the verification are determined based on the context information.