PREVENTION OF UNINTENDED DISTRIBUTION OF AUDIO INFORMATION

• US 20140309999A1
• Filed: 08/14/2013
• Published: 10/16/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 04/16/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Basson, Sara H., Kanevsky, Dimitri, Malkin, Peter K., Wegman, Mark N.
• Granted Patent: US 9,666,209 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/270
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 25/00 Speech or voice analysis techniques not restricted to a single one of groups G10L15/00 - G10L21/00 muting semiconductor-based amplifiers when some special characteristics of a signal are sensed by a speech detector, e.g. sensing when no signal is present, H03G3/34
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 25/51 for comparison or discrimination
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 27/00 Public address systems circuits for preventing acoustic reaction H04R3/02; circuits for distributing signals to loudspeakers H04R3/12; monitoring or testing arrangements for public address systems H04R29/007; amplifiers H03F

Abstract

Preventing unintended distribution of audio information may comprise analyzing audio data of a speaker'"'"'s speech received by a microphone; determining automatically by a processor, from the analyzing whether the speaker'"'"'s speech is intended to be distributed to an audience via the microphone; and in response to determining that the speaker'"'"'s speech is not intended to be distributed to the audience via the microphone, performing one or more actions.

Claims

1. A computer readable storage medium storing a program of instructions executable by a machine to perform a method of preventing unintended distribution of audio information, the method comprising:

analyzing by a processor, audio data of a speaker'"'"'s speech received by a microphone;

determining automatically by the processor, from the analyzing whether the speaker'"'"'s speech is intended to be distributed to an audience via the microphone; and

in response to determining that the speaker'"'"'s speech is not intended to be distributed to the audience via the microphone, performing one or more actions.

2. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the analyzing comprises detecting a change in a voice volume of a speaker making the speech, a change in harmonics of the speech, a change in a manner of the speech, a change in a topic of the speech, or combinations thereof.

3. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, further comprising collecting visual cues and the visual cues are also used to determine whether the speaker'"'"'s speech is intended to be distributed.

4. The computer readable storage medium of claim 3, wherein the visual cues comprises a change in distance between a speaker making the speech and the microphone, a change in location from where the speaker is making the speech, or combinations thereof.

5. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, further comprising collecting motion data associated with a speaker making the speech, and further using the motion data to determine whether the speaker'"'"'s speech is intended to be distributed.

6. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the one or more actions comprises providing a feedback to the speaker, muting the microphone, turning off the microphone, or combinations thereof.

7. The computer readable storage medium of claim 6, wherein the feedback comprises one or more of flashing lamp, tactile signal, audio signal, a transcription of the speech on a display, or combinations thereof.

8. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, further comprising analyzing non-speech information to determine whether the speaker'"'"'s speech is intended to be distributed.

9. A system for preventing unintended distribution of audio information, comprising:

a microphone;

a processor operable to analyze audio data of a speaker'"'"'s speech received by the microphone and further operable to determine automatically whether the speaker'"'"'s speech is intended to be distributed to an audience via the microphone, and in response to determining that the speaker'"'"'s speech is not intended to be distributed to the audience via the microphone, the processor operable to perform one or more actions.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the processor analyzes to detect a change in a voice volume of a speaker making the speech, a change in harmonics of the speech, a change in a manner of the speech, a change in a topic of the speech, or combinations thereof.

11. The system of claim 9, further comprising a camera operable to collect visual cues and the processor further uses the visual cues to determine whether the speaker'"'"'s speech is intended to be distributed, wherein the visual cues comprises a change in distance between a speaker making the speech and the microphone, a change in location from where the speaker is making the speech, or combinations thereof.

12. The system of claim 9, wherein the one or more actions comprises providing a feedback to the speaker, muting the microphone, turning off the microphone, or combinations thereof.