Patent ID: 9485236
Filing Date: 2016-11-01
CPC Classification: H04L

Claim Text:
1. A method for verifying the on-line identity of subscribed users for a system, comprising the following steps: a) enrolling the subject user in the system to establish a baseline user profile including a first set of identity-related data/information and at least one verifiably unique identifier; b) evaluating the first set of identity-related data/information acquired from the subject user during enrollment, and assigning an initial verification level to the user profile of the subject user indicative of the evaluated reliability of the on-line identity of the subject user based on the evaluation of the first set of identity-related data/information; c) after step (b) is performed, obtaining a second set of identity-related data/information regarding the subject user from one or more information aggregators that are associated with the system; d) evaluating the second set of identity-related data/information acquired from the information aggregator(s), and assigning a second verification level to the user profile of the subject user indicative of the evaluated reliability of the on-line identity of the subject user based on the evaluations of the first and second sets of identity-related data/information; e) after step (d) is performed, obtaining a third set of identity-related data/information regarding the subject user from social media sites that are not associated with the system; f) evaluating and comparing the third set of identity-related data/information acquired from the social media sites to the previously obtained first and second sets of identity-related data/information, and assigning a third verification level to the user profile of the subject user indicative of the evaluated reliability of the identity of the subject user based on a comparison of the third set of identity-related data/information to the previously obtained first and second sets of identity-related data/information; and g) periodically repeating steps e) and f) to continuously acquire updates to the third set of identity-related data/information, evaluate and compare the updated third set of identify-related data/information and assign an updated third verification level to the user profile of the subject user.