Patent ID: 8214446
Filing Date: 2012-07-03
Classification: G06F,G06Q,H04L

Abstract:
1. A computer-implemented method for controlling access to content of an electronic messaging system, the method comprising: under control of one or more computer systems configured with executable instructions, providing a user interface for displaying at least a portion of the content of the electronic message board on a computing device; receiving, via the user interface, a request from a user to perform an action with respect to a selected thread on an electronic message board, the electronic messaging system capable of hosting a plurality of threads on the electronic message board; retrieving access criteria associated with the action to be performed on the selected thread, each thread on the electronic message board having access criteria for each of a plurality of actions capable of being performed with respect to the thread, the access criteria for the plurality of threads specifying at least a strong level of authentication and a weak level of authentication for one or more actions on one or more of the threads; in response to receiving the request, determining the level of authentication specified by the access criteria for the selected thread and the requested action; determining whether the user is authorized to perform the requested action by validating user profile information associated with the user against the specified level of authentication, the user profile information being accessed using a user profile module configured to obtain the user profile information from at least one data store, the user profile information capable of being validated using a credit card number of the user for the strong level of authentication and capable of being validated using at least one of a gender, and age, or a zip code of the user for the weak level of authentication; and performing the requested action when the user is determined to be authorized to perform the action on the selected thread.