Methods and apparatus for blocking usage tracking

• US 8,819,817 B2
• Filed: 05/25/2011
• Issued: 08/26/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 05/25/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Croll, Brian, Adler, Darin B., Decker, Kevin W., Falkenburg, Steven J., Hatcher, Timothy G., Jin, Jing, Melton, Donald D., Stachowiak, Maciej, Weinig, Samuel M., Weinstein, Brian A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Zecher, Dede
• Assistant Examiner(s): Su, Sarah
• Application Number:
  US13/115,880
• Publication Number:
  US 20120304286A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,189 Days
• Field of Search: 726/22, 726/26, 726/27, 713/189
• US Class Current: 726/22
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/60 Protecting data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/62 Protecting access to data via a platform, e.g. using keys or access control rules
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/6263 during internet communication, e.g. revealing personal data from cookies
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34

Abstract

Methods and apparatuses that maintain one or more data stores capable of storing local data in a device for loading a resource of a domain are described. The resource may be loaded to cause one or more data access operations on the data stores. Access to usage tracking data of the device from the domain may depend on at least one of the data access operations. The data access operations may be configured to block the usage tracking data of the device from the domain. The data access operations may be performed on the data stores for the loading of the resource. A web page may be presented to a user when the resource is successfully loaded.

Claims

1. A machine-readable non-transitory storage medium having instructions therein, which when executed by a machine, causes the machine to perform a method, the method comprising:

maintaining one or more data stores storing local data in a device, the local data including usage tracking data of the device, the usage tracking data accessible via one or more data access operations on the data stores, wherein statuses returned from the data access operations indicate whether the data access operations are successful;

configuring the data access operations to block a domain from access to the usage tracking data of the device, the data access operations configured to return the statuses indicating that the data access operations are successful while the domain is blocked from the access to the usage tracking data of the device;

loading a resource from the domain for a web page based on the resource, wherein the loading of the resource invokes the data access operations configured for accessing the usage tracking data, wherein whether the web page is compatible depends on whether the statuses indicate success of the data access operations; and

performing the data access operations on the data stores according to the configuration of the data access operations for the loading of the resource, wherein the resource is successfully loaded for a presentation of the web page to be compatible with the statuses indicating the success of the data access operations performed while the domain is blocked from the access to the usage tracking data.

2. The medium of claim 1, wherein the web page is rendered via a first party resource from a first party domain identified in a request received from a user, wherein the loading of the resource is caused by the first party resource and wherein the loading of the resource is transparent to the user.

3. The medium of claim 2, wherein the data access operations are associated with a session identifier valid for a limited period of time, and wherein the performing the data access operations comprises:

updating at least one of the data stores with a change associated with the session identifier when the session identifier is valid; and

removing the change associated with the session identifier from the at least one data stores when the session identifier expires outside the limited period of time.

4. The medium of claim 3, wherein the session identifier is associated with a window displaying the web page in the presentation and wherein the session identifier expires when the window closes.

5. The medium of claim 2, wherein at least one of the data stores includes partitions for separate domains, and wherein the configuration comprises:

associating the access operations with the first party domain, wherein the access operations are limited to access partitions of the first party domain in the data stores.

6. The medium of claim 5, wherein the data stores are accessed via APIs (application programming interface) and wherein the data access operations are explicitly specified in the resources via the APIs.

7. The medium of claim 5, wherein the data stores includes a cache store, wherein the data access operations to access the cache store and wherein performing the data access operations comprises:

storing a copy of the resource in a partition of the first party domain in the cache store.

8. The medium of claim 7, the performing the data access operations further comprising:

retrieving the resource from the partition of the first party domain in the cache store.

9. The medium of claim 1, wherein the device includes a persistent storage device, wherein the data access operations identify one of the data stores, and wherein performing the data access operations comprises:

storing a data item keyed by the domain to the identified data store with an indicator to prevent storing the data item persistently in the persistent storage device.

10. The medium of claim 1, wherein the resource includes APIs (application programming interface) to invoke the data access operations, and wherein performing the data access operations comprises:

returning status to the API calls without updating the data stores, the status indicating the API calls complete successfully.

11. The medium of claim 10, wherein the resource includes script code calling the APIs and wherein the script code is executed for the loading of the resource.

12. The medium of claim 10, wherein the API calls include identifiers indicating whether the API calls are caused via resources loaded from the domain.

13. The medium of claim 1, wherein the resource specifies a plug-in module including the data access operations capable of updating one of the data stores associated with the plug-in module, and wherein the plug-in module is independent of data stores other than the associated data store.

14. The medium of claim 13, wherein the configuration comprises:

invoking the plug-in module within a virtual machine sandboxing the one data store.

15. The medium of claim 13, wherein the configuration comprises:

invoking the plug-in module with a private mode, wherein the data access operations are limited to read access to the associated data store with the private mode.

16. A machine-readable non-transitory storage medium having instructions therein, which when executed by a machine, causes the machine to perform a method, the method comprising:

loading a first party resource from a first party domain to a device for a presentation of a web page based on the first party resource, the loading of the first party resource to cause loading of a resource of a third party domain of a third party type with respect to the first party resource of the first party domain, the loading of the resource of the third party domain to cause data access operations via a plug-in module to access local data stores, the data access operations to return statuses indicating whether the data access operations are successful, and wherein whether the web page is compatible depends on whether the data access operations are successful based on the statuses;

configuring, in response to the loading of the first party resource, the plug-in module to block usage tracking on the device from the third party domain, wherein the data access operations are allowed via the configured plug-in module for the loading of the resource of the third party domain and the data access operations via the configured plug-in module to return the statuses indicating the data access operations are successful with access of the usage tracking blocked from the third party domain; and

invoking the plug-in module configured to perform the data access operations for the loading of the resource of the third party domain, wherein the resource is successfully loaded based on the statuses returned for a presentation of the web page of the first party resource, the web page to be compatible without the usage tracking accessed by the third party domain.

17. The medium of claim 16, wherein the first party resource is loaded according to a request received from a user of the device and wherein the loading of the resource is caused by the first party resource transparent to the user.

18. The medium of claim 16, wherein the plug-in module is associated with a path to a storage location in the device to store local data, and wherein the configuration comprises:

allocating a temporary storage location of a temporary path in the device; and

redirecting the path to the temporary path in the device, wherein the plug-in module is capable of accessing the temporary location via the path and wherein the plug-in module is prohibited from accessing the storage location.

19. The medium of claim 18, wherein the first party resource is rendered in a web page presented to the user and wherein the temporary storage is made inaccessible when the web page is closed.

20. A computer implemented method comprises:

maintaining one or more data stores storing local data in a device, the local data including usage tracking data of the device, the usage tracking data accessible via one or more data access operations on the data stores, wherein statuses returned from the data access operations indicate whether the data access operations are successful;

configuring the data access operations to block a domain from access to the usage tracking data of the device, the data access operations configured to return the statuses indicating that the data access operations are successful while the domain is blocked from the access to the usage tracking data of the device;

loading a resource from the domain for a web page based on the resource, wherein the loading of the resource invokes the data access operations configured for accessing the usage tracking data for the domain, wherein whether the web page is compatible depends on whether the statuses indicate success of the data access operations; and

performing the data access operations on the data stores according to the configuration of the data access operations for the web page based on the resource loaded from the domain, wherein the web page is presented to be compatible with statuses indicating the success of the data access operations performed while the domain is blocked from the access to the usage tracking data.