Patent Issued for Managing obfuscation of regulated sensitive data (USPTO 11308236): Kyndryl Inc.

2022 MAY 05 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- A patent by the inventors Anderson, Evelyn R (Houston, TX, US), Bender, Michael (Rye Brook, NY, US), Brooks Powell, Natalie (Bolingbrook, IL, US), Childress, Rhonda L. (Austin, TX, US), filed on August 12, 2020, was published online on April 19, 2022, according to news reporting originating from Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx correspondents.

Patent number 11308236 is assigned to Kyndryl Inc. (New York, New York, United States).

The following quote was obtained by the news editors from the background information supplied by the inventors: “The present invention relates generally to the field of managing sensitive data, and more particularly to managing obfuscation of regulated sensitive data.

“Data sanitization or data obfuscation techniques refer to techniques that remove or replace the sensitive text or information in confidential documents, in a manner that does not expose identifiable information or confidential information. When these desensitized or obfuscated documents are shared, the end users are then not able to gather any personal information related to individual data entities.

“Enterprises attempt to strike a balance between protecting their sensitive, or personal, data while allowing their personnel to utilize that sensitive data when needed in the operations of the enterprise, both internally and externally. Sensitive data often consists of employee, customer, partner, and vendor records containing sensitive details, for example, names of individuals, addresses, telephone numbers, email addresses, social security numbers, credit card information, biometric data, health insurance details, health records, and financial records. Such sensitive information is often shared through a variety of applications, including mobile applications, which may be viewed internally and externally with proper authorization. Enterprises take steps to keep such sensitive data private both to protect their own interests and the interests of their clients, partners, and customers. Much of this data is required by law to be kept private. For example, the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) act makes it mandatory for credit card payment processing companies to maintain data confidentiality while storing, processing, and exchanging credit card data. In another example, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a regulation in European Union (EU) law on data protection and privacy in the EU and the European Economic Area (EEA). A further example is the California Consumer Protection Act (CCPA) which is targeted toward privacy of data of individuals.”

In addition to the background information obtained for this patent, NewsRx journalists also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “Embodiments of the present invention disclose a method, a computer program product, and a system for managing obfuscation of regulated sensitive data. The method may include one or more computer processors detecting content for display on a computing device. One or more computer processors analyze the content for sensitive data. One or more computer processors retrieve one or more applicable regulations, where the regulations are associated with displaying sensitive data. One or more computer processors determine a location on the display for obfuscating the sensitive data in the content, based on the retrieved one or more applicable regulations. One or more computer processors identify one or more context rules applicable to the sensitive data in the content. One or more computer processors determine the one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations. One or more computer processors display the sensitive data in the content.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A method comprising: detecting, by one or more computer processors, content for displaying on a display of a computing device; analyzing, by one or more computer processors, the content for sensitive data based on obfuscation identifiers that include data that is used to identify a user of the computing device; retrieving, by one or more computer processors, one or more applicable regulations, wherein the regulations are associated with data sharing and data privacy regulations associated with displaying the sensitive data; determining, by one or more computer processors, a location on the display for obfuscating the sensitive data in the content, based on the retrieved one or more applicable regulations; identifying, by one or more computer processor, one or more context rules associated with sensitive data of the user of the computing device, wherein the sensitive data of the user of the computing device is applicable to the sensitive data in the content; determining, by one or more computer processors, whether the one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations with respect to displaying the sensitive data; and displaying, by one or more computer processors, the content in accordance with the determination of whether one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations with respect to displaying the sensitive data.

“2. The method of claim 1, further comprising: determining, by one or more computer processors, the one or more context rules do not override the one or more applicable regulations; and obfuscating, by one or more computer processors, the sensitive data in the content.

“3. The method of claim 1, further comprising: determining, by one or more computer processors, the one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations; and displaying, by one or more computer processors, the sensitive data in the content.

“4. The method of claim 1, wherein retrieving the one or more applicable regulations further comprises: retrieving, by one or more computer processors, one or more data privacy regulations; based on the retrieved one or more data privacy regulations, generating, by one or more computer processors, a corpus of data privacy rules; and storing, by one or more computer processors, the corpus of data privacy rules.

“5. The method of claim 4, wherein retrieving the one or more data privacy regulations further comprises: determining, by the one or more computer processors, a geo-location of the computing device; retrieving, by one or more computer processors, one or more data privacy regulations associated with the geo-location from one or more publicly available and trusted sources; and retrieving, by one or more computer processors, one or more data privacy regulations from one or more corporate databases.

“6. The method of claim 4, further comprising, retrieving, by one or more computer processors, an origin of each of the one or more data privacy regulations.

“7. The method of claim 1, further comprising, monitoring, by one or more computer processors, a geo-location of the computing device to change applied data privacy regulations based on a change in the geo-location of the computing device.

“8. The method of claim 1, further comprising: receiving, by one or more computer processors, the one or more obfuscation identifiers; receiving, by one or more computer processors, the one or more context rules, wherein each of the one or more context rules is associated with at least one of the one or more obfuscation identifiers; receiving, by one or more computer processors, priorities of the one or more context rules; storing, by one or more computer processors, the received one or more obfuscation identifiers, the received one or more context rules, and the received priorities of the one or more context rules; and resolving, by one or more computer processors, the one or more context rules and the one or more applicable regulations based on a location and a context of the user.

“9. A computer program product comprising: one or more computer readable storage media and program instructions collectively stored on the one or more computer readable storage media, the stored program instructions comprising: program instructions to detect content for displaying on a display of a computing device; program instructions to analyze the content for sensitive data based on obfuscation identifiers that include data that is used to identify a user of the computing device; program instructions to determine a geo-location of the computing device; program instructions to retrieve one or more applicable regulations associated with the geo-location, wherein the regulations are associated with data sharing and data privacy regulations associated with displaying the sensitive data; program instructions to determine a location on the display for obfuscating the sensitive data in the content, based on the retrieved one or more applicable regulations; program instructions to identify one or more context rules associated with sensitive data of the user of the computing device applicable to the sensitive data in the content, wherein the sensitive data of the user of the computing device is applicable to the sensitive data in the content; program instructions to determine whether the one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations with respect to displaying the sensitive data; and program instructions to display the content in accordance with the determination of whether one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations with respect to displaying the sensitive data.

“10. The computer program product of claim 9, the stored program instructions further comprising: program instructions to determine the one or more context rules do not override the one or more applicable regulations; and program instructions to obfuscate the sensitive data in the content.

“11. The computer program product of claim 9, the stored program instructions further comprising: program instructions to determine the one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations; and program instructions to display the sensitive data in the content.

“12. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein program instructions to retrieve the one or more applicable regulations comprise: program instructions to retrieve one or more data privacy regulations; based on the retrieved one or more data privacy regulations, program instructions to generate a corpus of data privacy rules; and program instructions to store the corpus of data privacy rules.

“13. The computer program product of claim 12, wherein program instructions to retrieve the one or more data privacy regulations comprise: program instructions to retrieve one or more data privacy regulations from one or more publicly available sources; and program instructions to retrieve one or more data privacy regulations from one or more corporate databases.

“14. The computer program product of claim 9, the stored program instructions further comprising: program instructions to receive the one or more obfuscation identifiers; program instructions to receive the one or more context rules, wherein each of the one or more context rules is associated with at least one of the one or more obfuscation identifiers; program instructions to receive priorities of the one or more context rules; program instructions to store the received one or more obfuscation identifiers, the received one or more context rules, and the received priorities of the one or more context rules; and program instructions to resolve the one or more context rules and the one or more applicable regulations based on a location and a context of the user.

“15. A computer system comprising: one or more computer processors; one or more computer readable storage media; program instructions collectively stored on the one or more computer readable storage media for execution by at least one of the one or more computer processors, the stored program instructions comprising: program instructions to detect content for displaying on a display of a computing device; program instructions to analyze the content for sensitive data based on obfuscation identifiers that include a data, a text, or an image that is used to identify a user of the computing device; program instructions to retrieve one or more applicable regulations, wherein the regulations are associated with data sharing and data privacy regulations associated with displaying the sensitive data; program instructions to determine a location on the display for obfuscating the sensitive data in the content, based on the retrieved one or more applicable regulations; program instructions to identify one or more context rules associated with sensitive data of the user of the computing device applicable to the sensitive data in the content, wherein the sensitive data of the user of the computing device is applicable to the sensitive data in the content; program instructions to determine whether the one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations with respect to displaying the sensitive data; and program instructions to display the content in accordance with the determination of whether one or more context rules override the one or more applicable regulations with respect to displaying the sensitive data.

“16. The computer system of claim 15, the stored program instructions further comprising: program instructions to determine the one or more context rules do not override the one or more applicable regulations; and program instructions to obfuscate the sensitive data in the content.”

There are additional claims. Please visit full patent to read further.

URL and more information on this patent, see: Anderson, Evelyn R. Managing obfuscation of regulated sensitive data. U.S. Patent Number 11308236, filed August 12, 2020, and published online on April 19, 2022. 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=11308236.PN.&OS=PN/11308236RS=PN/11308236

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