Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput – Computer network managing – Computer network monitoring
Reexamination Certificate
1997-10-29
2002-09-03
Sheikh, Ayaz (Department: 2155)
Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput
Computer network managing
Computer network monitoring
C709S223000, C709S225000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06446119
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the monitoring of computer usage and, in particular, to a system and method for monitoring or recording a user's activity on a computer system by capturing the content on a display screen.
Background and Objects of the Present Invention
Since the introduction of the personal computer in the early 1980's, the PC has been subject to constant change, ever increasing in capability and usage. From its earliest form in which the data accessible was limited to that which the user could load from a floppy disk to the typical gigabyte hard drives common on PCS today, the amount of data and the ease of obtaining this data have been growing rapidly. With the fruition of the computer network, the available data is no longer limited to the user's system or what the user can load on his system. Local Area Networks or LANs are now common in small businesses, and in such networks users may, in addition to their own local data, obtain data from other local stations as well as data that is available on the local server. Corporate networks and internetworks may connect multiple LANs, thereby increasing the data available to users. Larger still are Wide Area Networks (WANs) and Metropolitan Area Networks (MANs), the latter of which is designed to cover large cities.
The largest such network, commonly known as the Internet, has introduced vast amounts of information into the business place and the home. The individual networks that make up the Internet include networks which may be served from sources such as commercial servers (.com), university servers (.edu), research networks (.org, net), and military networks (.mil). These networks are located throughout the world and-their numbers are ever increasing with an estimated 85,000 new domain registrations presently occurring each month with countless Internet sites spawned from these domains.
With the exponential growth of the Internet and the explosion of interest worldwide, one natural consequence of this profundity is a growing diversity in the subject matter of the available information. Although-this was the original intent of the Internet developers, there are obvious disadvantages and undesirable consequences of such a global information exchange. What is quickly becoming a notorious example of such occurrence is the proliferation of pornography, hate materials, and other materials, some of which may not only be offensive, but illegal.
A specific difficulty encountered with the introduction of this powerful informational tool in the business and home is the logistical problem of governing the usage of the available data to specific users. In a corporate environment with access to, for example, the Internet, it is obviously advantageous for management to be able to limit or monitor in some fashion their employees' usage of such a resource not only to ensure productivity but to prevent liability for inappropriate employee Internet activities. Likewise, in the home, a parent may desire to have the beneficial educational information that exists in great quantity on the Internet available for his child, but, at the same time, may wish to prevent that child from accessing inappropriate materials, either by intent or accident.
In the discussion that follows, ‘operator’ will refer to the person attempting to monitor or block another person's activity on a computer system by any method or means. ‘User’ will refer to the person whose computer activity is subject to being monitored or blocked.
Currently, those companies with the financial resources desiring the efficiency of exchanging information through the Internet may elect to use an intranet, e.g., a LAN. This way, the company can distribute information to its employees with the conveniences of the Internet, but without actually being connected to the Internet. The company may also either block specific domains from access by its employees, or give access to only specified domains. This may be achieved by appropriate software or coding to block domains at a gateway or firewall. However, these methods may not be financially or technically feasible, or this may not serve the company's intent in any regard. Also, this technique does not prevent employees from loading computer games on their computer and playing them during work hours. Often, a company may desire that its employees have unlimited access to data resources through the Internet with the only restriction being that their access is useful for fulfilling the duties of their jobs. In this instance, it would be counterproductive to give access to only certain domains, as doing so would block access to future domains that may provide information beneficial to serving well an employee's position.
Commercially available applications to help combat this problem on the home or business PC are well known, such as Net Nanny™, Surf Watch™, and NetSnitch™. These applications and their respective limitations are now discussed.
Net Nanny™ is a software utility marketed to control, primarily, children's access to offensive Internet sites. This software's primary functionality is the use of an operator-defined, customized dictionary of terms or phrases to be blocked from access. In operation, Net Nanny™ performs a system shutdown whenever any material matching criteria in the operator-defined dictionary is accessed. This product works offline as well as online and performs a system shutdown when material matching specified criteria are accessed, where the material to be blocked could be loaded from floppy disks, CD-ROMS, local hard drives, network drives, or any other appropriate media. It can also be configured to provide the user a warning or to create a log of “offenses”—accesses to material that have been defined as offensive in the customized dictionary. Specific sites are also able to be blocked by the software operator, and similarly, the operator may make only certain sites available to be accessed.
Although this specific, operator-defined approach is somewhat useful, a number of limitations are apparent. For example, in utilizing a customized dictionary to block sites by keyword, the operator is responsible for formulating a list of words or phrases that could be included on a site with offensive material. Any descriptive phrases or terminology overlooked or unknown by the operator may therefore be readily available to the user. In addition, material deemed offensive to the operator is not necessarily described on a website by offensive descriptive words that would be detected by the blocking software. For example, pornographic material may be served from a server in a numeric index format. In this case, graphic files may be sequentially numbered with no descriptive text on that site. In this instance, it would not be possible for the blocking software to detect the presence of the offensive graphic material. The same case would be true when operating the blocking software offline. Unless a graphic file, for instance, was named with a title that matched an offensive criteria, the file could be viewed without generating a detection by the blocking software.
SurfWatch™ is another program designed to block children's or employees' access to offensive Internet sites. It is intended to solely block offensive Internet sites and is therefore utilized only for online activities. Primarily, it relies on blocking sites by use of a database that contains sites that have been determined to be offensive and by the use of keyword filters. The database is periodically updated and is available through a service with payment of a licensing fee. Through the licensing agency, criteria have been established as to what material is deemed offensive, which includes, but is not limited to, sexually explicit, violent, and/or illegal drug information. The software operator has configuration options available to alter the criteria by which Internet sites are blocked.
Again, the limitations are obvious. By relying on a licens
Friedler Ferenc
Kovacs Zoltan
Olah Laslo
Jenkens & Gilchrist A Professional Corporation
Olah Laslo
Sheikh Ayaz
Tran Philip B.
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