Patent Issued for Fraud detection based on geolocation data (USPTO 11838761): Allstate Insurance Company

2023 DEC 21 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventor Lippert, Keith Alan (Belfast, IE), filed on April 13, 2021, was published online on December 5, 2023.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 11838761 is Allstate Insurance Company (Northbrook, Illinois, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Detecting and preventing financial fraud in insurance and/or financial institutions has become a priority, especially with a rise in online transactions. Generally, financial fraud may lead to loss of wealth, personal or private information, data, and so forth. Many such activities may comprise accessing a person’s financial account to misappropriate funds and/or personal information. When such fraudulent activities are undetected and/or not mitigated, businesses may incur increased losses, including, but not limited to, an erosion of a customer base.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventor’s 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 fraud detection based on geolocation data. In particular, based on driving data, ranges of time may be determined when a driver of a vehicle has a low likelihood of accessing a web resource over a network. Accordingly, when an online activity is detected during such ranges of time, it may be an unauthorized activity.

“In some aspects, a time range determination system may include at least one processor and a memory unit storing computer-executable instructions. In some embodiments, the computer-executable instructions may be stored in one or more non-transitory computer-readable media. The time range determination system may be configured to, in operation, retrieve, by a computing device at a vehicle, driving data. The time range determination system may, in operation, determine, based on the driving data, a range of time when a driver of the vehicle has a low likelihood of accessing a web resource over a network. The time range determination system may, in operation, detect an online activity for an account associated with the driver. The time range determination system may, in operation, compare a time of the online activity to the range of time. The time range determination system may, in operation, based upon a determination that the time of the online activity is within the range of time, identify a potentially unauthorized activity. The time range determination system may be configured to, in operation, trigger, in response to the potentially unauthorized activity, one or more steps to protect the driver from the potentially unauthorized activity.

“In other aspects, the time range determination system may also be configured to, in operation, associate, by the computing device and with the range of time, a confidence level indicative of a strength of determining the range of time, and where the identifying the potentially unauthorized activity may be based on the confidence level. In some aspects, the time range determination system may, in operation, base the confidence level on the driving data.

“In some aspects, the time range determination system may, in operation, determine, based on the driving data, a first geographical region in which the vehicle is located and determine, based on the first geographical region, a first range of IP addresses. In some aspects, the time range determination system may, in operation, identify, based on the online activity, a second range of IP addresses, and where the triggering of the one or more steps to protect the driver from the potentially unauthorized activity may be based upon a determination that the first range of IP addresses does not overlap the second range of IP addresses.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A method comprising: retrieving, from a computing device at a vehicle, driving data; determining, based on the driving data, a range of time when a driver of the vehicle has a low likelihood of accessing a web resource over a network; and providing, to a third party, the range of time as a verification service for online activities.

“2. The method of claim 1, further comprising: determining a confidence level associated with the range of time, wherein the confidence level is indicative of a level of certainty that the driver of the vehicle was unable to access the web resource during the range of time, and wherein the confidence level is based on the driving data.

“3. The method of claim 1, wherein the computing device at the vehicle comprises an in-vehicle telematics device.

“4. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the range of time when the driver of the vehicle has the low likelihood of accessing the web resource over the network is based on a determination that the driver was driving the vehicle at a pre-determined speed.

“5. The method of claim 1, wherein the driving data comprises one or more of geo-location data, data indicative of whether the computing device is in possession of the driver or a passenger of the vehicle, a speed of the vehicle, acceleration data associated with the vehicle, and biometric data associated with the driver or the passenger.

“6. The method of claim 5, wherein the driving data comprises the geo-location data, the method further comprising: determining a driving pattern of the driver, wherein the determining the range of time is based on the driving pattern.

“7. The method of claim 1, further comprising: storing an association of the driver and a plurality of determined ranges of time during which the driver was unlikely to have accessed online resources.

“8. The method of claim 1, wherein the retrieving the driving data is responsive to a request, from the third party, for the range of time.

“9. A method comprising: retrieving, from a telematics device at a vehicle, driving data; determining, based on the driving data, a plurality of ranges of time when a driver of the vehicle had a low likelihood of accessing a web resource over a network; and providing, to a third party, the plurality of ranges of time as a verification service for online activities.

“10. The method of claim 9, further comprising: associating, with at least one range of time of the plurality of ranges of time, a confidence level indicative of a level of certainty that the driver of the vehicle was unable to access the web resource during the at least one range of time, wherein the confidence level is based on the driving data.

“11. The method of claim 9, wherein the determining the plurality of ranges of time when the driver of the vehicle had the low likelihood of accessing the web resource over the network is based on a determination that the driver was driving the vehicle at a pre-determined speed.

“12. The method of claim 9, wherein the driving data comprises one or more of geo-location data, a speed of the vehicle, acceleration data associated with the vehicle, and biometric data associated with the driver or a passenger.

“13. The method of claim 12, wherein the driving data comprises the geo-location data, the method further comprising: determining a driving pattern of the driver, wherein the determining the plurality of ranges of time is based on the driving pattern.

“14. The method of claim 9, further comprising: storing an association of the driver and the plurality of ranges of time when the driver was unlikely to have accessed online resources.

“15. The method of claim 9, wherein the retrieving the driving data is responsive to a request, from the third party, for the plurality of ranges of time.

“16. A method comprising: responsive to a request, from a third party, for a verification service for online activities associated with a driver of a vehicle, retrieving, from a computing device at the vehicle, driving data; determining, based on the driving data, that the driver has a low likelihood of accessing a web resource over a network; and providing, to the third party, an indication of the low likelihood.

“17. The method of claim 16, further comprising: determining a confidence level, wherein the confidence level is indicative of a level of certainty that the driver of the vehicle is unable to access the web resource, and wherein the confidence level is based on the driving data.

“18. The method of claim 16, wherein the computing device comprises a smartphone.

“19. The method of claim 16, wherein the determining that the driver has the low likelihood of accessing the web resource over the network is based on a determination that the driver is driving the vehicle at a pre-determined speed.

“20. The method of claim 16, wherein the driving data comprises one or more of geo-location data, data indicative of whether the computing device is in possession of the driver or a passenger of the vehicle, a speed of the vehicle, acceleration data associated with the vehicle, and biometric data associated with the driver or the passenger.”

For additional information on this patent, see: Lippert, Keith Alan. Fraud detection based on geolocation data. U.S. Patent Number 11838761, filed April 13, 2021, and published online on December 5, 2023. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11838761)&db=USPAT&type=ids

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