State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Assigned Patent for Vehicle Image

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Aug. 10 -- State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance, Bloomington, Illinois, has been assigned a patent (No. 10,373,264, initially filed June 30, 2017) developed by five co-inventors for a "vehicle image and sound data gathering for insurance rating purposes." The co-inventors are Scott T. Christensen, Salem, Oregon, Gregory Hayward, Bloomington, Illinois, Christopher E. Gay, Dallas, Texas, Steven Cielocha, Bloomington, Illinois, and Todd Binion, Bloomington, Illinois.

The full-text of the patent can be found at 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=10,373,264.PN.&OS=PN/10,373,264&RS=PN/10,373,264

The abstract states: "A method and computer system provides vehicle insurance underwriting and ratings to a policy holder. The method and system receives captured sensor data associated with a vehicle from the policy holder. For example, the captured sensor data may include vehicle image and sound data. The method and system may compare the received data to baseline data to determine an operating condition of the vehicle. Based at least in part on the determined operating condition of the vehicle, the method and system may identify a risk of loss for the vehicle. The method and system may then determine an insurance premium for the vehicle based at least in part on the identified risk of loss, and provide the determined insurance premium to the policy holder. In some embodiments, the sensor data is image and sound data captured by a user's mobile phone."

Written by Ranjan Behera; edited by Sudarshan Harpal.