Spam filtering and person profiles

• US 9,152,952 B2
• Filed: 12/13/2011
• Issued: 10/06/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 08/04/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Yahoo Assets LLC
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Smith, Adam Michael, Jacobson, Joshua Robert Russell, Kobashikawa, Brian Tadao, Thatcher, Gregory Garland
• Primary Examiner(s): DAILEY, THOMAS J
• Application Number:
  US13/324,979
• Publication Number:
  US 20120215861A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,393 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/212 using filtering or selective blocking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/23 Reliability checks, e.g. acknowledgments or fault reporting
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles

Abstract

Systems and methods to reduce false positives in spam filtering. In one aspect, a method includes automatically generating profiles for persons identified in messages, such as incoming and outgoing e-mails. Messages flagged as spam can be checked against the profile to identify false positives.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

scanning a first set of messages to generate a plurality of profiles for persons associated with one or more of the messages, the profiles including a first profile comprising a first address and an alternate address;

scanning, by a computer, a second set of messages that are classified by a spam filter as spam;

determining, by the computer, one or more false positive spam messages from the second set of messages classified as spam using one or more of the plurality of profiles, the determining the false positive spam messages comprising determining that a message of the second set of messages was received from the first address and that a user previously sent a message to the alternate address; and

presenting a list to identify the one or more false positive spam messages to the user.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising ranking the persons to determine relevancy scores for the persons.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the determining the false positive spam messages further comprises determining whether a person associated with a message has a relevancy score higher than a threshold.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising automatically adjusting the threshold based on a total number of the false positive spam messages in the list presented to the user.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining a relevancy score for each of the second set of messages, and wherein the determining the false positive spam messages further comprises using the relevancy score of a message of the second set of messages.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the determining the relevancy score comprises increasing a relevancy score when a message is moved by the user from an inbox to a folder.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the second set of messages is a subset of the first set of messages.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the false positive spam messages further comprises determining if a relevancy score of a sender is higher than a threshold.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the false positive spam messages further comprises determining if a message was sent to a person other than the user, the person having a relevancy score higher than a threshold.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the false positive spam messages further comprises determining if a body of a message includes an address of a person having a relevancy score higher than a threshold.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising storing a set of addresses, and wherein the determining the false positive spam messages further comprises comparing sender addresses of the second set of messages with the set of addresses to select the one or more false positive spam messages out of the second set of messages when one or more sender addresses are in the set of addresses.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising storing a set of addresses, and wherein the determining the false positive spam messages further comprises comparing recipient addresses of the second set of messages with the set of addresses to select the one or more false positive spam messages out of the second set of messages when one or more recipient addresses are in the set of addresses.

13. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

scanning a plurality of messages of the user to identify a set of addresses; and

storing the set of addresses;

wherein the determining the false positive spam messages further comprises comparing addresses used in the second set of messages with the set of addresses to select the one or more false positive spam messages out of the second set of messages.

14. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing computer-readable instructions, which when executed, cause a computer to:

store for a user a first set of messages and a second set of messages, the second set of messages being classified by a spam filter as spam;

scan, by the computer, the first set of messages to identify a plurality of addresses, and to identify names of persons at the addresses to generate profiles of the persons, each profile comprising at least two addresses used for electronic messaging, the profiles including a first profile comprising a first address and an alternate address;

compare, by the computer, addresses used in the second set of messages with addresses in the profiles, the comparing comprising determining that a first message in the second set of messages was received from the first address and that the user previously sent a message to the alternate address; and

based on determining that the first message in the second set of messages was received from the first address, identify the first message as a false positive.

15. The storage medium of claim 14, wherein the instructions further cause the computer to determine a relevancy score for each of the second set of messages, and wherein the identifying the first message as a false positive is further based on the relevancy score of the first message.

16. The storage medium of claim 15, wherein the determining the relevancy score comprises increasing the respective relevancy score when a message is moved by the user from an inbox to a folder.

17. A system, comprising:

at least one processor; and

memory storing instructions configured to instruct the at least one processor to;

scan a set of messages of a user to identify a plurality of addresses used in the messages;

identify names of persons at the addresses to generate profiles of the persons, each profile comprising at least two addresses used for electronic messaging by the respective person, the profiles including a first profile comprising a first address and an alternate address; and

filter spam messages out of incoming messages for the user using the profiles, the filtering comprising determining that a message was received from the first address and that the user previously sent a message to the alternate address.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the filtering of the spam messages further comprises determining if an incoming message was sent to a person other than the user, the person having a relevancy score higher than a threshold.