Patent Issued for Cyber-Security Presence Monitoring And Assessment (USPTO 10,419,455)

2019 SEP 30 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- According to news reporting originating from Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx journalists, a patent by the inventors Park, Jason D. (Chicago, IL); Hayes, Howard (Glencoe, IL); Chen, Tao (Northbrook, IL); Parkinson, John S. (Lake Forest, IL), filed on May 10, 2016, was published online on September 30, 2019.

The assignee for this patent, patent number 10,419,455, is Allstate Insurance Company (Northbrook, Illinois, United States).

Reporters obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “People and organizations may collect and/or analyze information, such as personal or confidential information of a user. Further, services, such as credit monitoring services or identity protection services, may monitor a user’s account in order to determine if a data breach has occurred. As consumers continue to gain an ever-increasing presence in online environments, there will be an ever-present need to better protect consumers from confidential information being breached (e.g., made available publicly) in order to protect consumers from fraud and/or other harms.”

In addition to obtaining background information on this patent, NewsRx editors also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “In light of the foregoing background, the following presents a simplified summary of the present disclosure in order to provide a basic understanding of some aspects of the invention. This summary is not an extensive overview of the invention. It is not intended to identify key or critical elements of the invention or to delineate the scope of the invention. The following summary merely presents some concepts of the invention in a simplified form as a prelude to the more detailed description provided below.

“Aspects of the disclosure address one or more of the issues mentioned above by disclosing methods, computer readable storage media, software, systems, and apparatuses for providing information relating to a risk of a data breach associated with a consumer. This may promote awareness regarding the risk of a data breach involving the consumer.

“Aspects of this disclosure provide a cyber-security data processing system that may identify a consumer, monitor for the presence of confidential information associated with the consumer, and/or establish a value associated with the cyber-security risks associated with the consumer. The cyber-security data processing system may collect information from various networks, devices, and/or services. The cyber-security data processing system may then calculate a value based on a probability that the consumer may experience a data breach. In some instances, the information and/or value may be presented on a marketplace for consumption by service providers.

“Of course, the methods and systems of the above-referenced embodiments may also include other additional elements, steps, computer-executable instructions, or computer-readable data structures. In this regard, other embodiments are disclosed and claimed herein as well. The details of these and other embodiments of the present invention are set forth in the accompanying drawings and the description below. Other features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the description, drawings, and claims.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“What is claimed is:

“1. A cyber-security system comprising: a cyber-traffic event analysis system implemented at least partially in hardware, and a cyber-security data processing system implemented at least partially in hardware: wherein the cyber-traffic event analysis system is configured to: monitor a communications network for confidential information associated with a consumer account associated with a consumer; determine, based on a number of devices on the communications network storing the confidential information and a number of digital accounts associated with the consumer on the communications network, a value indicative of a risk of a data breach; detect evidence of the data breach of the confidential information associated with the consumer account as a result of the monitoring; and report the evidence of the data breach to the cyber-security data processing system; wherein the cyber-security data processing system is configured to: receive the evidence of the data breach associated with the consumer account; determine, based on the evidence of the data breach, a probability that a future use of the confidential information will impact the consumer; and adjust the value based on the probability.

“2. The cyber-security system of claim 1, wherein the evidence of the data breach comprises a credit card number.

“3. The cyber-security system of claim 1, wherein the evidence of the data breach comprises credentials associated with the consumer account.

“4. The cyber-security system of claim 1, wherein the communications network comprises an Internet.

“5. The cyber-security system of claim 1, wherein the cyber-security data processing system is further configured to determine the value based on an online presence of the consumer.

“6. The cyber-security system of claim 1, wherein the cyber-security data processing system is further configured to: publish the value on an online marketplace; receive, via the online marketplace, a request for the value; and transmit the value to a service provider in response to the request.

“7. The cyber-security system of claim 1, wherein the cyber-security data processing system is further configured to: receive an indication that the consumer has undergone cyber-security training; adjust the value based on the cyber-security training; and transmit the adjusted value for presentation to the consumer.

“8. The method of claim 1, wherein the digital accounts comprise a banking account and a social media account.

“9. A method comprising: determining, by a security monitoring device, one or more accounts comprising confidential information associated with a consumer; scanning, by the security monitoring device, a local network associated with the consumer for one or more local devices on the local network; determine, based on the scanning, a number of devices on the local network storing the confidential information and a number of digital accounts associated with the consumer on the local network; monitoring, by the security monitoring device, an external network for a data breach associated with the confidential information; determining, by the security monitoring device, a value based on the determining the one or more accounts, the scanning the local network, the number of devices, the number of digital accounts and the monitoring the external network; and transmitting, by the security monitoring device, the value for presentation to the consumer.

“10. The method of claim 9, wherein the monitoring the external network for the data breach comprises monitoring one or more Internet sites for the confidential information.

“11. The method of claim 9, further comprising: publishing the value on an online marketplace; receiving, via the online marketplace, a request for the value; and transmitting the value to a service provider in response to the request.

“12. The method of claim 9, further comprising: detecting, after the transmitting the value, a new data breach associated with the confidential information; adjusting the value based on the detecting; and transmitting the adjusted value for presentation to the consumer.

“13. The method of claim 9, wherein the determining the value further comprises determining the value further based on information received from a credit monitoring service.

“14. The method of claim 9, further comprising: receiving an indication that the consumer has undergone cyber-security training; adjusting the value based on the cyber-security training; and transmitting the adjusted value for presentation to the consumer.

“15. A cyber-security data processing system comprising a cyber-traffic event analysis system and a cyber-security data processing system: a processor implemented at least partially in hardware; a memory unit storing computer-executable instructions, which when executed by the processor, cause the cyber-security data processing system to: monitor a communications network for confidential information associated with a consumer; determine, based on a number of devices on the communications network storing the confidential information and a number of digital accounts associated with the consumer on the communications network, a value indicative of a risk of a data breach; detect one or more instances of the confidential information on the communications network as a result of the monitoring; and receive additional information associated with the consumer from a service provider; determine a probability of a future fraudulent use of the confidential information impacting the consumer based on the one or more instances and the additional information; and adjust the value based on the probability.

“16. The cyber-security data processing system of claim 15, wherein the cyber-security data processing system further stores computing-executable instructions, which when executed by the processor, cause the cyber-security data processing system to: publish the value on an online marketplace; receive, via the online marketplace, a request for the value; and transmit the value to an insurance provider in response to the request.

“17. The cyber-security data processing system of claim 15, wherein the service provider comprises a credit monitoring service.

“18. The cyber-security data processing system of claim 15, wherein the cyber-security data processing system further stores computing-executable instructions, which when executed by the processor, cause the cyber-security data processing system to transmit the value to a device associated with the consumer.

“19. The cyber-security data processing system of claim 18, wherein the cyber-security data processing system further stores computing-executable instructions, which when executed by the processor, cause the cyber-security data processing system to: detect, after the transmitting the value, a new instance of the confidential information; adjust the value based on detecting the new instance; and transmit the adjusted value for presentation to the consumer.

“20. The cyber-security data processing system of claim 19, wherein the adjusted value is presented to the consumer as a number displayed via a cyber-security application on a mobile computing device.

“21. The cyber-security data processing system of claim 15, wherein the cyber-security data processing system further stores computing-executable instructions, which when executed by the processor, cause the cyber-security data processing system to: receive an indication that the consumer has undergone cyber-security training; adjust the value based on the cyber-security training; and transmit the adjusted value for presentation to the consumer.”

For more information, see this patent: Park, Jason D.; Hayes, Howard; Chen, Tao; Parkinson, John S. Cyber-Security Presence Monitoring And Assessment. U.S. Patent Number 10,419,455, filed May 10, 2016, and published online on September 30, 2019. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=10,419,455.PN.&OS=PN/10,419,455RS=PN/10,419,455

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