Personnel crisis communication management system

• US 9,218,432 B2
• Filed: 08/15/2014
• Issued: 12/22/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 03/15/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AtHoc Incorporated (Blackberry Limited)
• Original Assignee: AtHoc Incorporated (Blackberry Limited)
• Inventors: Miasnik, Guy, Siegel, Aviv, Gupta, Rakesh
• Primary Examiner(s): CERVETTI, DAVID GARCIA
• Application Number:
  US14/460,977
• Publication Number:
  US 20140379721A1
• Time in Patent Office: 494 Days
• Field of Search: 726/22
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/335 Filtering based on additional data, e.g. user or group profiles filtering in web context G06F16/9535, G06F16/9536
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/35 Clustering; Classification
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/95 Retrieval from the web
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/20 for the management or administration of healthcare resources or facilities, e.g. managing hospital staff or surgery rooms
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/67 for remote operation
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/20 for computer-aided diagnosis, e.g. based on medical expert systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0227 Filtering policies mail message filtering H04L51/212
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/08 for authentication of entities cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication H04L9/32
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/5116 for emergency applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/61 Time-dependent
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/63 Location-dependent; Proximity-dependent
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/14 Short messaging services, e.g. short message services [SMS] or unstructured supplementary service data [USSD]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/60 Subscription-based services using application servers or record carriers, e.g. SIM application toolkits
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/90 Services for handling of emergency or hazardous situations, e.g. earthquake and tsunami warning systems [ETWS]

Abstract

Systems and methods are disclosed for providing personnel communications management within an enterprise or group of related enterprises during crisis situations. In particular, the systems and methods provide event management, shared situational awareness, personnel tracking, and unified crisis notification management to multiple users.

Claims

1. An integrated crisis communications management system for distributing information, comprising:

a database, stored on a non-transitory computer readable medium, including data about a plurality of entities and a first event record including information about a real-world crisis event;

an inbound event management subsystem operably connected to the database, the inbound event management subsystem, responsive to receiving a first communication that is not yet associated with an event record in the database, analyzing first content of the first communication to determine whether the first content corresponds to an event record in the database, associating the first communication with the first event record as corresponding to the real-world crisis event responsive to the analyzing, and supplementing the first event record with information about the real-world crisis event included in the first communication; and

a shared situational awareness subsystem, operably connected to the database, the shared situational awareness subsystem providing, to a first device associated with a first entity, a first subset of the information about the real-world crisis event, and providing, to a second device associated with a second entity, a second subset of the information about the real-world crisis event, the first subset being determined based on data about the first entity stored in the database, and the second subset being determined based on data about the second entity stored in the database.

2. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, further comprising:

a notification subsystem operably connected to the inbound event management subsystem, the notification subsystem sending, to one or more devices and responsive to the first communication, a notification that new information is available.

3. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein analyzing first content of the first communication comprises:

comparing metadata included in the first communication with data describing the real-world crisis event in the first event record; and

determining the first communication corresponds to the real-world crisis event if the metadata included in the first communication matches the data describing the real-world crisis event within a threshold tolerance, the threshold tolerance requiring less than an identical match.

4. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the inbound event management subsystem creates a new event record in the database responsive to analysis of second content of a second communication failing to identify an event record in the database to which the second communication corresponds, and adds information to the new event record based on the second content of the second communication.

5. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the first entity is an enterprise constituent of a first type and the second entity is an enterprise constituent of a second type.

6. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 5, wherein the first type is one of:

emergency management personnel, emergency first responders, incident commanders, enterprise members, and individuals related to an enterprise member.

7. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the first device is one of:

a networked computer;

a smart-phone;

an IP phone;

a tablet;

a satellite phone;

a landline phone;

a mobile phone;

a social network server configured to distribute the additional notification through via a social network;

a speaker system;

a display board;

a TV system;

a Land Mobile Radio;

a Voice-Enabled Fire Alarm Control Panel; and

a web site server configured to add the additional notification to a web site feed.

8. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the entities include users, the crisis communications management system further comprising:

a personnel tracking subsystem for tracking the status of a plurality of tracked users, the tracking comprising;

receiving status updates from a first subset of a plurality of user devices, each user device associated with a corresponding tracked user, and each response including a status for the corresponding tracked user; and

providing for presentation of the statuses of the users corresponding to the first subset of user devices.

9. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 8, wherein the tracking further comprises:

identifying a second subset of the user devices from which recent status updates have not been received;

determining, for each of the second subset of the user devices, an inferred status for the corresponding tracked user, the inferred status based on previous status information associated with the corresponding tracked user; and

providing, for presentation in conjunction with the statuses of users corresponding to the first subset of user devices, the inferred statuses of the tracked users corresponding to the second subset of user devices.

10. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 8, wherein the statuses and inferred statuses are presented by:

providing a dashboard display indicating the status of viewed users, the viewed users being a subset of the tracked users;

providing user interface controls in conjunction with the dashboard display for at least one of;

viewing the status of a selected one of the viewed users in greater detail, filtering the viewed users based on status, filtering the viewed user based on location, filtering the viewed users based on assigned roles, and filtering the viewed users based on recency of status updates.

11. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the first communication is received from a device, and the inbound event management subsystem, on receiving the first communication, performs processes including:

authenticating credentials of the device;

validating the first content contained within the first communication; and

acknowledging receipt of the first communication to the device.

12. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the first communication is received from an automated system, and the inbound event management subsystem, responsive to receiving the first communication, performs processes including:

authenticating credentials of the automated system; and

validating the first content contained within the first communication.

13. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the inbound event management subsystem further associates the real-world crisis event with a security/sensitivity categorization based on the first communication and stores the security/sensitivity categorization in the first event record, the first and second subsets being determined based on the security/sensitivity categorization.

14. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the first subset of the information about the real-world crisis event is determined based on at least one of:

a type of the real-world crisis event;

a role of the first entity;

a role of the first entity in relation to the type of the real-world crisis event;

a geographical location of the first entity;

a geographical location associated with the first communication;

characteristics of the first device; and

characteristics of a network connecting the integrated crisis communications management system to the first device.

15. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein:

the inbound event management subsystem, responsive to receiving a second communication including updated information about the real-world crisis event, updates the information about the real-world crisis event in the first event record stored in the database; and

the shared situational awareness subsystem, responsive to the information about the real-world crisis event being updated, updates the first and second subsets and provides the updated first and second subsets to the first and second devices, respectively.

16. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 1, wherein the first communication is received from a device, and analyzing first content of the first communication comprises:

authenticating credentials of the device;

validating the first content contained within the first communication;

extracting from the first content a location, a time, and a description;

determining whether the location is within a perimeter stored in the event record;

determining whether the time is within a timespan stored in the event record;

responsive to determining the location is within the perimeter and the time is within the timespan, adding the first communication to a collection of messages associated with the first event record;

determining whether the description matches existing information stored in the event record;

responsive to determining the description does not match the existing information, updating the event record based on the first communication; and

persisting the first communication in the database.

17. The integrated crisis communications management system of claim 16, wherein determining whether the description matches existing information stored in the event record comprises:

identifying keywords in the description;

identifying keywords in the existing information; and

determining the description does not match the existing information responsive to the description including a keyword not present in the existing information.

18. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing executable computer program instructions for providing crisis communications management, the computer program instructions when executed causes one or more computing systems to:

receive a first communication including additional information about a real-world crisis event, the first communication not yet associated with an event record in an event database;

determine, based on analysis of content of the first communication, that the real-world crisis event corresponds to a first event record in the event database, the first event record containing available information about the real-world crisis event;

supplement the available information in the first event record with the additional information about the real-world crisis event included in the first communication; and

provide each of a plurality of devices with a corresponding view of information included in the first event record, the view of information included in the first event record provided to each device based on information about an entity associated with that device stored in an entity database.

19. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the computer program instructions further comprise instructions that when executed causes the one or more computing systems to:

identify a plurality of entities associated with the real-world crisis event to which additional information is available based on properties of the real-world crisis event and information about the plurality of entities stored in the event database; and

send a notification to a plurality of devices associated with the plurality of entities, the notification indicating the available information about the real-world crisis event has been supplemented.

20. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the computer program instructions further comprise instructions that when executed causes the one or more computing systems to:

receive status updates from a first subset of a plurality of user devices, each user device associated with a corresponding tracked user, and each status update including a status for the corresponding tracked user;

identify a second subset of the user devices from which recent status updates have not been received;

determine, for each of the second subset of the user devices, an inferred status for the corresponding tracked user, the inferred status based on previous status information associated with the corresponding tracked user;

aggregate the statuses and inferred statuses of the tracked users;

provide a dashboard display indicating the status of viewed users, the viewed users being a subset of the tracked users; and

provide, for a third user, user interface controls for at least one of;

viewing the status of a selected one of the viewed users in greater detail, filtering the viewed users based on status, filtering the viewed users based on location, filtering the viewed users based on assigned roles, and filtering the viewed users based on recency of status updates.

21. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the computer program instructions further comprise instructions that when executed causes the one or more computing systems to:

send an additional notification to a notification device associated with the real-world crisis event, the notification device being one of;

a networked computer;

a smart-phone;

a tablet;

an IP phone;

a satellite phone;

a landline phone;

a mobile phone;

a social network server configured to distribute the additional notification through via a social network;

a speaker system;

a display board;

a TV system;

a Land Mobile Radio;

a Fire Alarm Control Panel; and

a web site server configured to add the notification to a web site feed.

22. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 21, wherein the computer program instructions further comprise instructions that when executed causes the one or more computing systems to:

authenticate credentials of a device from which the first communication was received;

validate the additional information within the first communication; and

acknowledge receipt of the first communication to the device.

23. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the first communication is received from an automated system and the computer program instructions further comprise instructions that when executed causes the one or more computing systems to:

authenticate credentials of the automated system; and

validate content contained within the first communication.

24. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the computer program instructions further comprise instructions that when executed causes the one or more computing systems to:

determine a security/sensitivity categorization for the real-world crisis event based on the available information about the real-world crisis event; and

store the security/sensitivity categorization in the first event record.

25. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the information about an entity includes at least one of:

a permission level of the entity;

a role of the entity;

a geographical location of the entity;

characteristics of a device corresponding to the entity; and

characteristics of a network to which the device corresponding to the entity is connected.

26. A computer-implemented method for crisis communications management for an enterprise, comprising:

receiving a message including new information about a real-world crisis event, the message not yet associated with any event record in an event database;

analyzing the message to determine an association between the real-world crisis event and a first event entry in the event database, the event database including a plurality of event entries, each containing existing information about a corresponding real-world crisis event;

adding the new information to the first event entry in the event database responsive to the determined association;

identifying a first subset of entities and a second subset of entities based on information about entities stored in a database;

generating, responsive to the new information being substantially different to the existing information, a first report about the real-world crisis event based on;

the new information, the first event entry, and information stored in a database about the first subset of entities;

generating, responsive to the new information being substantially different to the existing information, a second report about the real-world crisis event based on;

the new information, the first event entry, and information stored in a database about the second subset of entities;

transmitting the first report to devices associated with the first subset of entities; and

transmitting the second report to user devices associated with the second subset of entities.

27. The method of claim 26, further comprising:

comparing the new information to existing information about the real-world crisis event in the first event entry in the event database, the comparing comprising;

identifying keywords in the new information;

identifying keywords in the existing information; and

determining the new information to be substantially different to the existing information responsive to the new information including a keyword not present in the existing information.

28. The method of claim 26, wherein analyzing the message comprises:

comparing location data included in the message with location data included in the first event entry;

comparing time data included in the message with time data included in the first event entry; and

determining that the real-world crisis event is associated to the first event entry responsive to the comparing location data and the comparing time data.

29. The method of claim 26, wherein analyzing the message comprises:

comparing position information included in the message with position information associated with the first event entry to determine a position difference;

comparing time information included in the message with time information associated with the first event entry to determine a time difference; and

determining the association between the real-world crisis event and the first event entry responsive to the position difference being less than a position threshold and the time difference being less than a time threshold, the position and time thresholds being greater than zero.

30. The method of claim 26, further comprising:

receiving position data for a plurality of users at regular time intervals, the position data indicating a location of corresponding users when the data was sent; and

providing, for display at a device, the location of at least one of the plurality of users.

31. The method of claim 26, further comprising:

requesting status updates from a plurality of users;

receiving a status update from at least one of the plurality of users, the status update including a current status; and

providing, for display at a device, the current status.