COMPUTING DEVICE AND SYSTEM FOR RENDERING CONTACT INFORMATION THAT IS RETRIEVED FROM A NETWORK SERVICE

• US 20180338039A1
• Filed: 04/10/2018
• Published: 11/22/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 10/16/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Neustar Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Neustar Incorporated
• Inventors: Cody, Tim, Sena, Jr., Guido Jonjie S., Politz, Ken, Devolites, John, Cooley, Michael
• Granted Patent: US 10,547,739 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/575 Means for retrieving and displaying personal data about calling party
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/663 Preventing unauthorised calls to a telephone set
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/7243 with interactive means for internal management of messages
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2203/354 Reverse directory service
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/42042 Notifying the called party of information on the calling party details within substation equipment H04M1/57, signalling details H04Q3/72
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/42059 Making use of the calling party identifier
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/4931 Directory assistance systems

Abstract

A contact information system provides an independent network authority for providing contact information in connection with incoming calls or messages. The contact information system utilizes a database of communication identifiers to provide contact information for end user devices that receive incoming communications which specify communication identifiers that are stored in the database.

Claims

1. A method for operating a computing device, the method comprising:

(a) determining a communication identifier of an incoming communication;

(b) initiating a retrieval process to retrieve information associated with the communication identifier from a predetermined network location of a network authority; and

(c) rendering the retrieved information using the computing device.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein (a) includes determining a phone number of an incoming call, Short Message Service (SMS) message or Multimedia Message Service message (MMS).

3. The method of claim 1, wherein (a) through (c) are performed by at least one of a phone application, voice network service or messaging application.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of (a) through (c) is performed by an operating level component of the computing device.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein (a) through (c) are performed on the computing device in response to an incoming call, and while the incoming call is pending on the computing device before being answered.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein (c) includes displaying branding content of an entity that is authenticated by the network authority as being associated with a phone number of an incoming call or message.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein (b) includes making a determination as to whether locally stored information is associated with the identifier, and then performing a network retrieval based on the determination.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein (b) is performed when the determination is that no locally stored information is associated with the identifier.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein initiating the retrieval process includes making a secure connection to the network location.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the incoming communication is communicated to the computing device over at least one of a Public Switch Telephone Network (“

PSTN”

), cellular network, or Internet Protocol network.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

displaying, in connection with an incoming call or message, one or more features to perform a corresponding one or more alternative actions other than answering the incoming call.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

displaying a feature to enable a user to provide input about an incoming call or message to the network authority.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein (c) includes displaying the retrieved information as part of a header or message body of an incoming message.