FR2872602A1 - Unwanted message controlling process for motor telephone, involves producing report message of stored unwanted message, receiving report message by recipient and making decision whether to obtain or delete unwanted messages - Google Patents

Abstract

The process involves maintaining a received message in a normal message routing circuit if the message is a desired message, and storing the message in a unwanted message database if the message is unwanted message. A report message of the stored unwanted message is produced. The report message is received by a recipient, and a decision is made whether to obtain or delete the unwanted messages.

Description

Method of managing unsolicited messages

  The subject of the invention is a method for managing unsolicited messages. An unsolicited message is a message that the recipient of said message receives without having provided his e-mail address to the sender of said message. An unsolicited message is also a message having a generic character, that is to say, not specifically addressed to the recipient of said message. An unsolicited message is also called a SPAM. By extension to talk about unsolicited messages we talk about SPAM. These messages are usually advertising or malicious. The field of the invention is that of electronic mail and more particularly that of electronic messaging on mobile terminals such as mobile phones.

  An object of the invention is to limit the number of unsolicited messages presented to a user of a terminal.

  In the state of the art the number of unsolicited messages circulating on the networks increases day by day to currently represent more than 60% of the network traffic. The reading of these messages takes a considerable time to those to whom they are addressed. The solutions proposed by the state of the art to limit the inconvenience caused by these messages consist in automatically erasing the messages identified as being unsolicited messages.

  Among the weaknesses of these methods is cited at least the risk of erasing by mistake and without the recipient's agreement a solicited message. Another weakness is the obligation for the recipient of the messages, solicited or not, to exhaustively view all the messages received to ensure that they have consulted all the requested messages. This operation must also be performed daily, each time the user consults his mail in fact.

  In the invention, these problems are solved by storage of unsolicited messages, which messages are not presented to the user. These stored messages are not destroyed, however. They are used to produce a report message. A summary message summarizes, for example, the unsolicited messages received. A report message is, for example, a list of unsolicited message digests, each digest being associated with a frequency. This frequency represents the number of similar unsolicited messages that were received. Alternatively, the report message is an invitation to connect to a server to view unsolicited messages.

  In the invention the user is therefore not daily bothered with unsolicited messages. It is only when it receives a report message that greatly simplifies the decision on the fate of unsolicited messages. Moreover, the report message is only a summary of the unsolicited messages actually received, is traveled much faster than the unsolicited messages themselves.

  The subject of the invention is therefore a method for managing unsolicited messages, characterized in that it comprises the following steps: reception of at least one message; qualification of at least the message received in message requested or not solicited, - in the case of a solicited message, maintenance of the message in the normal message routing circuit, - if it is an unsolicited message, storage of this message in a database of unsolicited message data, - triggered production of a message message of stored unsolicited messages, the generated message message being sent to the recipient of these unsolicited messages, - reception of the message of the report by the recipient unsolicited messages, and decision on the part of the recipient on the treatment to be given to these messages, they can be viewed in different modes or deleted.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the qualification of a message is carried out on the basis of a list of identifiers of transmitters authorized by the recipient of the messages.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the operator forces the acceptance of messages transmitted by transmitters elected by the operator.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the qualification of a message is done on the basis of a statistical analysis of the message, or of a message flow in which the message is located, the messages considered as non-messages. solicited being marked as such.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the production of the report message is triggered by the amount of received unsolicited messages.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the production of the report message is triggered at regular intervals.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the report message lists the unsolicited messages stored, each unsolicited message being associated with a counter of occurrences of said unsolicited message in the unsolicited messages stored.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the report message proposes to the recipient of the report message several modes of consultation of the unsolicited messages, these modes of consultation being included in the group consisting of at least: consultation of messages unsolicited on a server via a universal address of location, - consultation of unsolicited messages by receiving one or more electronic messages - consultation of unsolicited messages by reception via their own initial media, consultation of unsolicited messages by reception of voice messages.

  The list of consultation methods proposed above is obviously not exhaustive, any other equivalent mode of consultation is of course also concerned.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the report message comprises a universal location address allowing the recipient of the report message to connect to a server to choose its consultation mode.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that the report message allows the recipient of the report message to choose his view mode from a list by returning this report message to a particular short number, for example as follows. : forwarding on a short number A with the entry of an e-mail address for receiving unsolicited messages, - forwarding on a short number B for reception of unsolicited messages by their initial media, - forwarding on a short number C for receiving unsolicited messages by voicemail.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that it is implemented at the level of a telecommunication network equipment used for routing messages.

  Advantageously, the invention is also characterized in that it is implemented directly on the terminal of the recipient user of the messages.

  The invention will be better understood on reading the description which follows and the examination of the figures which accompany it. These are presented as an indication and in no way limitative of the invention. The figures show: FIG. 1: an illustration of equipment useful for carrying out the method according to the invention, FIG. 2: an illustration of steps of the method according to the invention, FIG. 3: an illustration of a simplified structure a short message.

  Figure 1 shows a telecommunications network 101. In our example the network 101 is a GSM network comprising all the elements allowing the routing of voice communications and digital messages according to this standard. The method according to the invention is however applicable to other standards such as other second generation standards (DCS, PCS for example), two-point fifth generation (GPRS for example) and the third generation standards (UMTS by example). In a GSM network, digital messages are called short messages or SMS messages (short message service).

  FIG. 1 diagrammatically represents the network 101 and shows that it comprises a core 102 of the network to which at least one server 103 capable of transmitting short messages is connected, at least one base station 104 to which mobile terminals 105.1 to 105 are connected. .n capable of transmitting and receiving short messages, and at least one server 106 SMS-C responsible for the management of short messages in the network 101.

  In an alternative embodiment of the invention the network 101 also includes a server 107 for intercepting unsolicited messages. In another variant, the functions of the interception server 107 are performed by the SMS-C server 106. In the example of FIG. 1, the interception server 107 is connected in break, or in interception, with respect to the SMS-C server 106. In a GSM network, an SMS-C server processes all the short messages passing through the network. The fact of connecting the interrupt interception server 107 means that the server 107 also sees all the short messages passing through the network, and this before the server 106. The server 107 can thus perform a processing on the short messages. before these are processed by the server 106.

  FIG. 1 shows that the interception server 107 comprises a microprocessor 108, a program memory 109, an unsolicited message storage memory 110, a user address book memory 111 and connection interface circuits 112 with the user. heart 102 of the network 101 and the server 106 SMS-C. The elements 108 to 112 are connected by a bus 113.

  In this description, when an action is taken to a device, this action is actually performed by a microprocessor of this device controlled by instruction codes stored in a program memory of this device.

  The memory 109 comprises several zones, each of these zones corresponding to instruction codes enabling the server 107 to perform a function. Among these functions the memory comprises at least one zone 109.a for the reception of short message, a zone 109.b for the qualification of a short message in solicited or unsolicited message, a zone 109.c for storing messages. unsolicited, an area 109.d for the production and delivery of report messages and an area 109.e for destocking unsolicited messages.

  The memory 110 is here described as a table, each row of this table corresponding to a record, each column to a property of the record. A line of the table 110 makes it possible to describe a short message. The table 110 comprises a column 110a corresponding to a recipient identifier, a column 110b corresponding to an issuer identifier, a column 110c corresponding to the message itself and, in one variant, a column 110d corresponding to an unsolicited message identifier. The identifier of the column 110d makes it possible to carry out groupings of similar unsolicited messages, similar unsolicited messages having the same unsolicited message identifier.

  FIG. 2 shows a step 201 of receiving a short message 300 by the server 107. FIG. 3 shows that the message 300 comprises a header 301 and a body 302. The header 301 comprises at least one field 303 recipient identifier, and an issuer identifier field 304. The identifiers 303 and 304 are, in a preferred example, telephone numbers. The body 302 is the text of the message which is presented to the recipient of said message 300. In the case of a short message according to the GSM standard, the body of the message is a succession of a maximum of 162 characters, each character being coded by a byte.

  In variants of the invention, the method is applied to other types of messages, for example MMS messages (Multimedia Message Service, for multimedia message service), or more generally to e-mails. The identifiers can therefore also be Internet addresses, e-mail addresses, or any other form of electronic identifiers. Similarly, the body of the message can take various forms, the most general known being multimedia content described using HTML or SMIL type of language.

  From step 201, the server 107 proceeds to a step 202 of qualification of the message 300. In this step, the received message is classified as a solicited message or an unsolicited message. In a variant of the invention it is quite possible that the message 300 has already been qualified by a server not shown. In this case the header 301 includes a field indicating the qualification of the message. This field is, for example, the one whose content will be stored in column 110d. In another variant, the server 107 performs the qualification of the message itself. There is a wide variety of ways to achieve this qualification, one of which is a statistical analysis of the content 302 of the message 300 based on a keyword dictionary. Another method consists in filtering according to the content of the field 304 identifying the issuer of the message 300. For this purpose the server 107 uses the contents of the memory 111.

  The memory 111 comprises a series of at least one list. A list in the memory 111 is identified by an identifier 111a. In our example of processing short messages, the identifier 111a is a telephone number. A list of the memory 111 also comprises a list 111 b of telephone numbers, more generally issuer identifiers, corresponding to the transmitters from which the user identified by the content of the field 111 has accepted to receive short messages. In this variant, the server 107 uses the content of the field 303 to determine a list in the memory 111. Once this list is determined, the server searches for the content of the field 304. If this search is unsuccessful, then the message 300 is qualified. in unsolicited message, otherwise it is a solicited message. Each user subscribed to the operator managing the server 107 has a list of its own in the memory 111. Each user has access to his list to update it by adding or deleting issuer identifiers.

  In this variant, a mobile operator managing the server 107 has the means of forcing certain transmitter identifiers to be considered as being part of all the lists of the memory 111. In this case the server 107 comprises, for example, a not shown memory for the recording of issuer identifiers whose messages are systematically called solicited messages whatever the contents of the lists of the memory 111.

  From step 202, the server 107 proceeds to a step 203 of routing the message according to the result of the qualification performed in step 202. If the message 300 has been qualified as a solicited message, then the server 107 goes into a step 204, otherwise, the server 107 goes into a step 205.

  In step 204, the server 107 sends the message 300 without any additional processing, and the message 300 sent by the server 107 is received by its recipient without the latter noticing the interception performed by the server 107. From step 204 the server 107 proceeds to step 201 in which it starts processing a new short message.

  In this case the server 107 is completely transparent in the network 101.

  In step 205 the server 107 stores the message 300 in the memory 110. To perform this recording the server 107 creates a new line in the memory 110, the column 110a of this new line is assigned to the value of the field 303, the column 110b of this new line is assigned to the value of field 304, column 110c of this new line is assigned to the value of field 302, and column 110d of this new line is assigned to the result of the qualification of message 300 in a variant where this result includes more information than the simple nature, solicited or unsolicited, of the message 300.

  From step 205 the server goes to step 201, but also to a step 206 of evaluating a threshold of unsolicited messages. In practice, step 206 is not necessarily executed after step 205, but rather at predetermined regular intervals. The threshold is to be considered for each possible value in column 110a. The messages stored in the memory 110 can indeed be gathered according to the value of the column 110a. This makes it possible to determine all the unsolicited messages intended for a single user.

  The threshold evaluated at step 206 may be at least two natures: a temporal nature, or a quantitative nature.

  If we consider a temporal nature for the threshold, this means that the server 107 manages a counter enabling it to measure a time interval, the server 107 going from step 206 to a step 207 each time this time interval is reached. has passed. In this case step 207 is therefore executed periodically. This time interval may be unique for all users referenced in column 110a, or individual. In the case of an individual interval the server 107 has as many counters as different users referenced in the column 110a.

  A time threshold can be of the order of a few days to a week.

  If we consider a quantitative nature for the threshold, it means that for each user referenced in column 110a, the server 107 counts the number of corresponding unsolicited messages. If this number exceeds a predetermined threshold then the server 107 goes from step 206 to step 207. This predetermined threshold is either common to all users, or individual.

  A quantitative threshold may for example be between a dozen and a hundred messages.

  Step 207 is here described for a user, that is to say for a possible value for the column 110a. Of course this treatment is performed for all possible values in column 110a. Step 207 is a step of producing a report message.

  In step 207, the server 107 uses the value of the user identifier of the column 110a for which the threshold has been crossed in step 206. This identifier idU makes it possible to gather, during a first grouping, all the messages of the memory 110 corresponding to the identifier idU. Once gathered, these messages are regrouped again, in a second grouping, according to another criterion. This other criterion is either the content of column 110d or the contents of column 110b. Consider that the second grouping is performed according to the content of column 110b, then the result of step 207 is a message presenting a list of sender IDs, with each sender ID being associated with a number of unsolicited messages. . If 162 characters are not enough to code this report message, then the report message will be sent in as many short messages as required. In a variant, the report message also includes the first words of each message from the second grouping. This allows the recipient of the report message to better judge whether or not to receive an unsolicited message.

  In another variant of the invention the report message comprises a URL (Universal Resource Locator), including the identifier idU and designating a server, for example the server 107, to access the unsolicited messages corresponding to the identifier idU by an interface type Internet explorer. In this case the server 107 includes instruction codes corresponding to the implementation of an HTTP server software for interpreting such a URL address.

  In other variants, the report message provides the recipient of the report message several ways of viewing unsolicited messages. For example, in the report message to each of these modes is associated a short number. The user then only has to call one of these short numbers, or return the report message to one of these short number, to obtain the unsolicited messages. Thus, the report message provides a short number on which to return the report message to receive unsolicited messages. The report message that can be edited to select which unsolicited messages should be received. The report message also includes a short number to be dialed to receive all the unsolicited messages stored by the server 107 for the user dialing this short number. The report message also includes a short number corresponding to a voice server that transforms the unsolicited messages into voice messages that the user can then listen. When listening to voice, the user can choose to keep each message unsolicited or erased, as on a traditional voicemail.

  During a request to send unsolicited messages, these are preferably sent via their original media, ie SMS messages in the case of the description. However in a variant the possibility is offered to the user to select another media, such as email, to receive these unsolicited short messages.

  Among these variants, the report messages may include one or more solutions.

  From step 207, the server 107 proceeds to a step 208 in which the short message (s) corresponding to the report message are sent to the user identified by the identifier idU.

  In the same step 208, the terminal corresponding to the identifier idU receives the report message and presents it to the user U of said terminal.

  In step 208, the server 107 then proceeds to a step 209 waiting for the user U's response to the report message.

  Either the response is a message destruction response in which case the server proceeds to a step 210 of destruction of the unsolicited messages corresponding to the identifier idU, or the response is a consultation message in which case the server 107 goes to a step 211 transmission of unsolicited messages.

  In step 210, the server 107 receives a message comprising at least one destruction instruction code and a user identifier. In this case, this user identifier corresponds to the issuer identifier field of the destruction message. On receipt of this message, the server 107 traverses the memory 110 and erases all the lines whose identifier of the column 110a corresponds to the issuer identifier of the destruction message.

  In step 211 the server receives a transmission request message comprising at least one user identifier which corresponds in this case to the issuer identifier of the transmission request message.

  The transmission request message also includes a designation of the unsolicited messages that the user wishes to receive. Such a designation is either generic, of the type to send all the messages, or more precise by designating which messages must be emitted. Such a precise designation is achieved, for example, by a list of issuer IDs. On receipt of this transmission request message, the server searches the memory 110 for messages corresponding to both the user identifier for the column 110a and the designations for the column 110b. Each corresponding message is then sent to the user and erased from the memory 110. Only one copy of each unsolicited message is sent.

  Steps 211 and 210 are destocking steps. In a preferred variant of the invention, each message of the memory 110 is associated with a date of reception of this message by the server 107. The server 107 regularly traverses the memory 107 and deletes the messages whose reception date is too old by relative to the date of travel of the memory 110. Such seniority may correspond for example to a period of 72 hours. In this mode of operation the absence of a user's response is equivalent to a response of destruction of the unsolicited messages.

  In the example described, the steps of the method according to the invention are implemented by a server. In practice the invention can also be implemented at a mobile phone. In this case, the unsolicited messages described as unsolicited messages are not presented to the user but stored by the mobile terminal as would a server. The terminal produces report messages that are presented to the user. The mobile terminal uses the response, or lack of response, from the user to present or destroy the unsolicited messages stored.

Claims (1)

13 Claims   1 - Unsolicited message management method characterized in that it comprises the following steps: - reception (201) of at least one message, - qualification (202) of at least the message received message solicited or not solicited, - if it is (203) a solicited message, maintains (204) the message in the normal message routing circuit, - if it is (203) an unsolicited message storing (205) this message in an unsolicited message database, generating (207) triggered (206) a message message of the stored unsolicited messages, the generated message message being sent to the recipient of these unsolicited messages, receipt (208) of the message of the report by the recipient of unsolicited messages, and decision on the part of the recipient on the treatment to be given to these messages, they can be viewed according to different modes or erased.   2 - Process according to claim 1, characterized in that the qualification of a message is performed on the basis of a list of identifiers of transmitters authorized by the recipient of the messages.   3 - Process according to claim 2, characterized in that the operator forces the acceptance of messages issued by transmitters elected by the operator.   4 - Method according to one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that the qualification of a message is done on the basis of a statistical analysis of the message, or a message flow in which is said message, messages considered as unsolicited messages are then marked as unsolicited messages.   - Method according to one of claims 1 to 4, characterized in that the production of the report message is triggered by the amount of unsolicited messages received.   6 - Method according to one of claims 1 to 5, characterized in that the production of the report message is triggered at regular intervals.   7- Method according to one of claims 1 to 6, characterized in that the report message lists the unsolicited messages stored, each unsolicited message being associated with a counter of occurrences of said unsolicited message in the unsolicited messages stored.   8 - Method according to one of claims 1 to 7, characterized in that the report message provides the recipient of the report message several ways of viewing unsolicited messages, these consultation modes being included in the group consisting of at least: consultation of unsolicited messages on a server via a universal address of location, - consultation of unsolicited messages by receiving one or more electronic messages - consultation of unsolicited messages by reception via their own initial media, consultation unsolicited messages by receiving voice messages.   9 - Method according to one of claims 1 to 8, characterized in that the report message returned to a particular short number allows the recipient of the report message to choose its consultation mode directly from its terminal.   - Method according to one of claims 1 to 8, characterized in that the report message contains a universal location address allowing the recipient of the report message to connect to a server to choose its mode of consultation of messages not solicited.   11 - Method according to one of claims 1 to 10, characterized in that it is implemented at a telecommunication network equipment used for routing messages.   12 - Method according to one of claims 1 to 10, characterized in that it is implemented directly on the terminal of the user receiving messages.