Patent Issued for System for improving data security when storing data (USPTO 11829513): The Prudential Insurance Company of America

2023 DEC 18 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventors Apsingekar, Venkatesh Sarvottamrao (San Jose, CA, US), Lavine, James Francis (Corte Madera, CA, US), Motadoo, Sahil Vinod (Sunnyvale, CA, US), Schille, Christopher John (San Jose, CA, US), filed on May 2, 2022, was published online on November 28, 2023.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 11829513 is The Prudential Insurance Company of America (Newark, New Jersey, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Users provide their information (e.g., name, address, telephone number, email address, social security number, etc.) in a variety of contexts (e.g., mortgage applications, credit card applications, financial account applications, air travel ticket orders, medical office visits, etc.). If this information were exposed to or taken by a malicious user, then the malicious user would be able to use this information to impersonate the users to conduct undesired or unwanted transactions.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “Users provide information (e.g., name, address, telephone number, email address, social security number, etc.) in a variety of contexts (e.g., mortgage applications, credit card applications, financial account applications, air travel ticket orders, medical office visits, etc.). If this information were exposed to or taken by a malicious user, then the malicious user would be able to use this information to impersonate the users to conduct undesired or unwanted transactions.

“In conventional systems, the users have very little control over this information. The users provide their information to a provider to gain access to goods or services from the provider. The provider maintains the information (e.g., on a server). If that server were to be breached by a malicious user, the information would be exposed to the malicious user. Additionally, some providers even sell the information to other providers, often unbeknownst to the users. This sale and movement of the information further exposes the information to malicious users and lessens the control that the users have over such information.

“This disclosure contemplates an unconventional system for securing information (e.g., a user’s personally identifiable information (PII)). Generally, the system allows the user to store his PII on a personal device, such as a smartphone. When a third party wants to access the user’s PII (e.g., to update the PII or to retrieve the PII), a notification will be presented to the user on the personal device seeking consent to the access. The notification may inform the user as to what information is being requested and which entity is requesting the access. The requested access will be denied unless the user consents to the access. In this manner, the user is given control over the dissemination of his PII. Additionally, the system alters or adjusts the PII that is stored in third-party servers so that even if these servers are breached, the user’s actual PII is not exposed.

“According to an embodiment, a system includes a device of a user and a token handler separate from the device. The device receives personally identifiable information the user and encrypts the personally identifiable information to produce first encrypted personally identifiable information. The token handler receives the first encrypted personally identifiable information from the device of the user, decrypts the first encrypted personally identifiable information to produce the personally identifiable information, generates a token representing the personally identifiable information, and receives the token indicating a request for the personally identifiable information. The device receives consent from the user to provide the personally identifiable information in response to the request for the personally identifiable information, in response to receiving the consent from the user, encrypts the personally identifiable information to produce second encrypted personally identifiable information, and communicates the second encrypted personally identifiable information to the token handler.

“When PII is to be stored or updated, the system first seeks consent from the user for the PII store or update. If the user grants consent, then the system stores the PII in the user’s personal device or updates the PII stored in the user’s personal device. The system then generates a token representing the PII. The token can be presented at a later time to redeem or access the PII, subject to the user’s consent. Even if the token were taken by a malicious user, it would not be possible for the malicious user to determine the user’s actual PII from the token. In this manner, the security of the PII is improved over conventional systems.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A system for securing personally identifiable information, the system comprising: a hardware processor configured to: receive, from an external system, a request to store information associated with a user, the request to store comprising the information associated with the user encrypted using a public encryption key; and a device of the user configured to: establish a connection with the hardware processor; after establishing the connection, request consent from the user to store the information associated with the user; in response to receiving the consent from the user: encrypt, using a salted passphrase, the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key to produce the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key and the salted passphrase; and store the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key and the salted passphrase in a repository; the hardware processor is further configured to: in response to determining that the device has stored the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key and the salted passphrase, generate a token representing the information associated with the user; and update the status of the request to store.

“2. The system of claim 1, wherein the external system is configured to: in response to the updated status of the request to store, retrieve, from the hardware processor, the token; and store the token in a database.

“3. The system of claim 1, wherein: the device of the user is further configured to generate the salted passphrase by: receiving a passphrase from the user; and hashing the passphrase with a phone number and an email address of the user to produce the salted passphrase; and the hardware processor is further configured to generate the public encryption key for the hardware processor using a public encryption key for the device.

“4. The system of claim 1, wherein the hardware processor is further configured to, in response to receiving the request to store, wait for the device to establish the connection with the hardware processor.

“5. The system of claim 1, wherein the hardware processor is further configured to: encrypt a portion of the information associated with the user using a public encryption key of the external system and the public encryption key of the hardware processor; and store, in a cloud, the portion of the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key of the external system and the public encryption key of the hardware processor.

“6. The system of claim 5, wherein the device is further configured to store, in a repository, the portion of the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key of the external system and the public encryption key of the hardware processor.

“7. The system of claim 1, wherein the device is further configured to: in response to the updated status of the request to store, retrieve, from the hardware processor, the token; and store the token in a repository.

“8. The system of claim 1, wherein the device is further configured to push the repository to a cloud after storing the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key of the hardware processor and the salted passphrase in the repository.

“9. The system of claim 1, wherein the external system is configured to initiate redemption of the information associated with the user by presenting the token to the hardware processor.

“10. The system of claim 1, wherein the hardware processor is further configured to: adjust the information associated with the user to produce anonymized data; and generate an identifier for a ledger storing the anonymized data.

“11. A method for securing personally information, the method comprising: receiving, by a hardware processor, from an external system, a request to store information associated with a user, the request to store comprising the information associated with the user encrypted using a public encryption key; establishing, by a device of the user, a connection with the hardware processor; after establishing the connection, requesting, by the device, consent from the user to store the information associated with the user; in response to receiving the consent from the user: encrypting, by the device, using a salted passphrase, the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key to produce the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key and the salted passphrase; and storing, by the device, the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key and the salted passphrase in a repository; in response to determining that the device has stored the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key and the salted passphrase, generating, by the hardware processor, a token representing the information associated with the user; and updating, by the hardware processor, the status of the request to store.

“12. The method of claim 11, further comprising: in response to the updated status of the request to store, retrieving, by the external system, from the hardware processor, the token; and storing, by the external system, the token in a database.

“13. The method of claim 11, further comprising: generating, by the device of the user, the salted passphrase by: receiving a passphrase from the user; and hashing the passphrase with a phone number and an email address of the user to produce the salted passphrase; and generating, by the hardware processor, the public encryption key for the hardware processor using a public encryption key for the device.

“14. The method of claim 11, further comprising waiting, by the hardware processor, in response to receiving the request to store, for the device to establish the connection with the hardware processor.

“15. The method of claim 11, further comprising: encrypting, by the hardware processor, a portion of the information associated with the user using a public encryption key of the external system and the public encryption key of the hardware processor; and storing, by the hardware processor, in a cloud, the portion of the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key of the external system and the public encryption key of the hardware processor.

“16. The method of claim 15, further comprising storing, by the device, in a repository, the portion of the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key of the external system and the public encryption key of the hardware processor.

“17. The method of claim 11, further comprising: in response to the updated status of the request to store, retrieving, by the device, from the hardware processor, the token; and storing, by the device, the token in a repository.

“18. The method of claim 11, further comprising pushing, by the device, the repository to a cloud after storing the information associated with the user encrypted using the public encryption key of the hardware processor and the salted passphrase in the repository.

“19. The method of claim 11, further comprising initiating, by the external system, redemption of the information associated with the user by presenting the token to the hardware processor.

“20. The method of claim 11, further comprising: adjusting, by the hardware processor, the information associated with the user to produce anonymized data; and generating, by the hardware processor, an identifier for a ledger storing the anonymized data.”

For additional information on this patent, see: Apsingekar, Venkatesh Sarvottamrao. System for improving data security when storing data. U.S. Patent Number 11829513, filed May 2, 2022, and published online on November 28, 2023. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11829513)&db=USPAT&type=ids

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