Patent Issued for Secure Remote Monitoring Data Validation (USPTO 10,740,848)

2020 AUG 26 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- A patent by the inventors Bernard, Daniel R. (West Hartford, CT); Brandi, Charles M. (Burlington, CT), filed on November 20, 2017, was published online on August 24, 2020, according to news reporting originating from Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx correspondents.

Patent number 10,740,848 is assigned to Hartford Fire Insurance Company (Hartford, Connecticut, United States).

The following quote was obtained by the news editors from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Insurance companies generally offer benefits to policyholders whose properties are receiving monitoring services from a remote monitoring service provider based on the reduction in the risk such services provide. These benefits are typically defined in a policyholder’s insurance policy, which are adjusted when there are changes to the benefits the policyholder receives. One such benefit is premium discounts, which can be as much as 20% of the non-discounted premium. However, recent underwriting reviews have determined that many policyholders who are receiving such benefits no longer receive remote monitoring services, contrary to the information they had initially provided to the insurance company. This is not surprising given that many policyholders cancel their remote monitoring services after they obtain an insurance policy yet fail to timely inform the insurance company of such a cancellation. However, policyholders without such remote monitoring services should not receive or continue to receive the benefits because the risks associated with their properties are, in fact, not reduced. Conversely, there are policyholders who have recently installed such a monitoring system and should, therefore, be given appropriate benefits.”

In addition to the background information obtained for this patent, NewsRx journalists also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “Thus, there exists a need for an efficient system that can repeatedly validate whether a policyholder’s property is currently being monitored by a remote monitoring services provider so that an insurance company can use such a system to determine an adjustment to the policyholder’s insurance policy.

“Additionally, because different policyholders may use different types of remote monitoring services covering various aspects of his/her property to differing degrees, there also exists a need for a system that can determine a policyholder’s policy adjustment based on the type and scope of coverage of the remote monitoring services the policyholder’s property is receiving.

“Allowing policyholders to continue to receive benefits after they have canceled their monitoring services reduces the incentive of the policyholders to continue their services with the service provider. At the same time, insurance companies and service providers generally do not want to share data with each other for various reasons, such as to protect the privacy of their policyholders, to protect the value of their customer lists, etc. Therefore, there exists a further need for a secure validation system to allow an insurance company and service providers to validate information provided by their respective customers without sharing each other’s data or with a minimum amount of data sharing or exchange.

“A system and method are disclosed herein for an automated validation system for repeatedly validating whether a property of a policyholder receiving an insurance benefit is presently receiving remote monitoring services as claimed by the policyholder.

“The system comprises an application server in communication with a trusted third party server and a business logic computer. The application server obtains information from a database information about at least one policyholder who is responsible for at least one property covered under a property insurance policy offered by an insurance company. A portion of the information indicates that the at least one property of the at least one policyholder is receiving remote monitoring services from a service provider. The application server requests the trusted third party to validate whether the at least one property of the at least one policyholder is currently receiving remote monitoring services from the service provider. The application server stores the validation results in the database. The business logic computer determines an insurance policy adjustment given to the at least one policyholder based, at least in part, on the validation results stored in the database.

“In some embodiments, the validation results include information about a type and a scope of coverage of remote monitoring services that the property is receiving. The policy adjustment comprises one of a change insurability of the property, policy premium discount, deductible, and dividend. The system further comprises a communication interface configured to notify (he policyholder of the policy adjustment via at least one of mail, email, text messages, a web-based application, and telephone calls. The business logic computer is hosted on a same computer system as the application server. Based at least in part on the validation results, the business logic computer can determine a monetary penalty for the policyholder. The trusted third party server can prevent the insurance company and the service provider from exchanging their respective customer lists. The system further comprises a sensor data collection system configured to receive sensor data associated with the remote monitoring services. The sensor data collection system can communicate with the application server. The application server also communicates with an emergency service provider.

“According to one aspect, the method comprises obtaining by an application server from a database information about at least one policyholder who is responsible for at least one property covered under a property insurance policy offered by an insurance company, wherein a portion of (the information indicates that at least one property of the at least one policyholder is receiving remote monitoring services from a service provider. The method also comprises requesting, by the application server, a trusted third party server to validate whether the policyholder is receiving remote monitoring services from the service provider. The method further comprises storing by the application server in the database validation results received from the trusted third party. The method finally comprises determining by a business logic computer in communication with the application server an insurance policy adjustment given to the policyholder based at least in part on the validation results stored in the database.

“According to yet another aspect, the invention relates to a non-transitory computer readable medium storing computer executable instructions, which, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to carry out the method and system functionality described above.

“According to a further aspect, the system described above can validate whether a policyholder of an insurance company is receiving remote monitoring services without a trusted third party. The application server can communicate with a service provider server directly to perform the validation without revealing the identity of the policyholder to the service provider. The application server stores validation results in an insurance company’s database. In some embodiments, the application server requests from the service provider server a hashed list of customers of the service provider who are receiving remote monitoring services for their properties. The validation results include at least a comparison between the hashed list of customers of the service provider and a hashed list of policyholders of the insurance company presently receiving at least one insurance benefit due to their usage of remote monitoring services for their properties.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“What is claimed is:

“1. A secure data validation system comprising: an application server configured to: provide a graphical user interface (GUI) to a policyholder, the GUI configured to display identification of a plurality of service providers for providing remote property monitoring services for at least one property of the policyholder, and to provide direct routing to a web site of one of the plurality of service providers responsive to a selection by the policyholder of the one of the plurality of service providers via the GUI; obtain, by the application server, from a database, information corresponding to the at least one property of the policyholder, the at least one property currently covered under a property insurance policy offered by an insurance company, wherein a portion of the information indicates that the at least one property is receiving remote monitoring services from one of the plurality of service providers; validate, by the application server, more than once during a term of the property insurance policy, via data communications with a server of a trusted third party, that the at least one property is currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the plurality of service providers, the trusted third party not being either the insurance company or the one of the plurality of service providers, the trusted third party server further receiving policy data from the insurance company application server and subscription data of customers of the one of the plurality of service providers from a server of the one of the plurality of service providers, and the validating being based on the received policy data and the received subscription data of customers without the trusted third party server providing data of the policyholders of the policies of the insurance company to the service provider server or providing customer data of the one of the plurality of service providers to the application server; store, by the application server, in the database, validation results received from the trusted third party server, and an insurance administration computer system in communication with the application server configured to determine an insurance policy adjustment to be applied to the property insurance policy, responsive to a determination based on the validation results and the portion of the information indicating receipt of remote monitoring services that the at least one property is either (i) not currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers or (ii) currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers different from the remote monitoring services indicated in the portion of the information indicating receipt of remote monitoring services, and is configured to determine that an insurance policy benefit applied to the property insurance policy remains unchanged responsive to a determination based on the validation results and the portion of the information indicating receipt of remote monitoring services that the at least one property is currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers as indicated in the portion of the information indicating receipt of remote monitoring services.

“2. The system of claim 1, wherein the remote monitoring services comprise sensors for detecting conditions at the at least one property.

“3. The system of claim 2, wherein the sensors comprise one or more of a water leakage sensor, a water pressure sensor, a window breakage sensor, a laser sensor, and a carbon monoxide sensor.

“4. The system of claim 1, wherein the trusted third party server is configured to validate by comparing names of policyholders of insurance policies offered by the insurance company, to names of customers of the one of the service providers, to identify matching names.

“5. The system of claim 4, wherein the comparing comprises identifying policyholder names not matching a name of any customer of the one of the service providers, approximating the names of the policyholders not matching a name of any customer of the one of the service providers, and comparing the approximated name with names of customers of the one of the service providers.

“6. The system of claim 5, wherein the approximating the names of the policyholders not matching a name of any customer of the one of the service providers comprises approximating the names of the policyholders within a predefined code distance apart from an original name of the current policyholder.

“7. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one property comprises at least one of personal assets and real property.

“8. The system of claim 1, wherein the insurance policy adjustment comprises at least one of a change to a premium, a change to a premium discount, a change to a coverage limit or a change to a deductible amount.

“9. A secure data validation method, comprising: providing, by an application server, a graphical user interface (GUI) to a policyholder, the GUI configured to display identification of a plurality of service providers for providing remote property monitoring services for at least one property of the policyholder, and to provide direct routing to a web site of one of the plurality of service providers responsive to a selection by the policyholder of the one of the plurality of service providers via the GUI; obtaining, by the application server, from a database, information about at least one property of the policyholder, the at least one property currently covered under a property insurance policy offered by an insurance company, wherein a portion of the information indicates that the at least one property is receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers, the remote monitoring services employing sensors for detecting one or more conditions at the at least one property; validating, by the application server, via data communications with a trusted third party server more than once during a term of the property insurance policy, that the at least one property is currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers, the trusted third party not being either the insurance company or the one of the service providers, the trusted third party server further receiving policy data from the insurance company and subscription data from the one of the service providers and the validating being based on the received policy data and the received subscription data without the trusted third party server providing data of policyholders of policies issued by the insurance company to the service provider server or providing customer data of the one of the service providers to the application server; storing, by the application server, in the database, validation results received from the trusted third party server; and responsive to a determination by the application server, based on the validation results and the portion of the information indicating receipt of remote monitoring services that the at least one property is either (i) not currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers or (ii) currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers different from the remote monitoring services indicated in the portion of the information indicating receipt of remote monitoring services, determining by an insurance administration computer system in communication with the application server an insurance policy adjustment to be applied to the property insurance policy, and determining by the insurance administration computer system that an insurance policy benefit applied to the property insurance policy remains unchanged responsive to a determination, by the application server, based on the validation results and the portion of the information indicating receipt of remote monitoring services that the at least one property is currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers as indicated in the portion of the information indicating receipt of remote monitoring services.

“10. The method of claim 9, further comprising comparing names of policyholders of insurance policies issued by the insurance company to names of customers of the one of the service providers to identify matching names, identifying policyholder names not matching a name of any customer, approximating the names of the policyholders not matching a name of any customer and comparing the approximated name with names of customers of the one of the service providers, wherein approximating the names of the policyholders not matching a name of any customer comprises approximating the names of the policyholders within a predefined code distance apart from an original name of the current policyholder.

“11. The method of claim 9, wherein the at least one property comprises at least one of real property, an aircraft or a watercraft.

“12. The method of claim 9, wherein the insurance policy adjustment comprises at least one of a change to a premium, a change to a premium discount, a change to a coverage limit or a change to a deductible amount.

“13. The method of claim 9, further comprising: receiving, by the application server from the service provider server, utilization data corresponding to a first type of remote monitoring services; and wherein determining, by the insurance administration computer system, whether the insurance policy benefit applied to the property insurance policy remains unchanged and the adjustment to the property insurance policy, is further based on the utilization data.

“14. A secure data validation system, comprising: an application server configured to: provide a graphical user interface (GUI) to policyholders, the GUI configured to display identification of a plurality of service providers for providing remote property monitoring services for a plurality of properties of the policyholders, and to provide direct routing to a web site of one of the plurality of service providers, responsive to a selection by one of the policyholders of the one of the plurality of service providers via the GUI, obtain, from a database coupled to the application server, information corresponding to the plurality of properties of the policyholders covered under a plurality of property insurance policies issued by an insurance company, the information indicating that the properties are receiving a first type of remote monitoring services from at least one of the service providers and that at least one insurance benefit has been applied to each of the property insurance policies due to the receipt of the first type of remote monitoring services; encrypt, using an encryption protocol, identifying data relating to the property insurance policies; receive, from a server of one of the service providers at least more than once during a term of each of the property insurance policies, encrypted identifying data relating to properties receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers, encrypted according to the encryption protocol; validate, at least more than once during the term of each of the property insurance policies, that a corresponding one of the plurality of properties is currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers, based on a comparison of the encrypted identifying data received from the one of the service providers and the encrypted identifying data relating to the property insurance policies; store, in the database, validation results data based on the validating; and an insurance administration computer system in communication with the application server configured to: responsive to the validation results data indicating that at least one of the plurality of properties is currently receiving the first type of remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers, determine that an insurance policy benefit applied to a corresponding one of the plurality of property insurance policies remains unchanged; and responsive to the validation results data indicating that at least one of the plurality of properties is (i) not currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers or (ii) currently receiving remote monitoring services from the one of the service providers different from the first type of remote monitoring services, determine an adjustment to a corresponding one of the plurality of property insurance policies.

“15. The system of claim 14, wherein at least one of the plurality of properties is one of a home and its associated grounds, an apartment complex, a condominium building and an office building.

“16. The system of claim 14, wherein the remote monitoring services comprise sensors, and the sensors comprise one or more of a water leakage sensor, a water pressure sensor, a window breakage sensor, a laser sensor, and a carbon monoxide sensor.

“17. The system of claim 14, wherein the insurance policy adjustment comprises at least one of a change to a premium, a change to a premium discount, a change to a coverage limit or a change to a deductible amount.

“18. The system of claim 14, wherein the encryption protocol comprises a hashing protocol for hashing data.

“19. The system of claim 18, wherein the encryption protocol further includes adding a salt string to data to be encrypted using the hashing protocol.

“20. The system of claim 14, wherein the application server is further configured to: receive, from the service provider server, utilization data corresponding to the first type of remote monitoring services; and wherein the insurance administration computer system is configured to determine whether the insurance policy benefit applied to the one of the plurality of property insurance policies remains unchanged, and the adjustment to the one of the plurality of property insurance policies, based further on the utilization data.”

URL and more information on this patent, see: Bernard, Daniel R.; Brandi, Charles M. Secure Remote Monitoring Data Validation. U.S. Patent Number 10,740,848, filed November 20, 2017, and published online on August 24, 2020. 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=10,740,848.PN.&OS=PN/10,740,848RS=PN/10,740,848

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