Abstract:
A method for locating a misplaced mobile phone, including receiving, by a mobile phone, a transmitted message, identifying, by the mobile phone, the transmitted message as being an alert request, and in response to the identifying, generating, by the mobile phone, an alert. A mobile phone is also described and claimed.

Description:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION 
     The field of the present invention is mobile phones. 
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     A common problem that arises with mobile electronic devices is locating a misplaced device. Cell phones, for example, are notorious for getting lost. 
     Conventionally there are two types of methods for locating a misplaced phone. One method, used primarily with cordless phones, involves paging the cordless phone from the phone&#39;s base station. When paged, the cordless phone generates an audible alert which enables a user to find the phone. This method generally does not apply to cell phones, since although cell phones are paged by operators via base stations, they do not have personal base station paging capability. 
     Another method for locating a misplaced phone is to call the phone from another phone. The misplaced phone can be tracked by its ringing sound. This method is commonly used for locating cell phones. However, this method does not work if the misplaced phone has been set to an inaudible ring mode, such as a silent or vibrating ring, or to a very low volume ring. 
     US Patent Application Publication No. 2007/0072620 A1 of Levitan, entitled SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR RECOVERING A LOST OR STOLEN WIRELESS DEVICE, describes use of a location server for storing user-associated location information. U.S. Patent Application No. 2007/0077924 A1 of Bhogal et al., entitled SYSTEM AND METHOD TO LOCATE MOBILE DEVICES HAVING INAUDIBLE SETTINGS, describes remotely adjusting the ring tone volume of a mobile phone, so that the ring tone is audible enough for a user to hear it. According to Bhogal et al., a user calls his misplaced phone from another phone. Upon connection to his misplaced phone, the user has command options to remotely change the misplaced phone&#39;s ring tone volume. 
     SUMMARY OF THE DESCRIPTION 
     Aspects of the present invention provide a method and system for locating a misplaced phone by sending an alert request message to the phone. The alert request message may be sent as an SMS or MMS message. Alternatively, the alert request message may be sent via BLUETOOTH® or via Wi-Fi. Yet alternatively, the alert request message may be sent via Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) from a mobile phone or from a PDA. Yet alternatively, the alert request message may be sent via a web server. 
     In response to receipt of the alert request message, the mobile phone sounds an audible alert, irrespective of whether the phone is set to silent, vibrate or audible ring mode. In addition, the phone may display a pre-designated message, such as “Please contact John at 123-456-7890”, so that whoever finds the phone knows how to contact its owner. The phone may also play a pre-designated audio or video segment. The phone may also vibrate. 
     There is thus provided in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention a method for locating a misplaced mobile phone, including receiving, by a mobile phone, a transmitted message, identifying, by the mobile phone, the transmitted message as being an alert request, and in response to the identifying, generating, by the mobile phone, an alert. 
     There is additionally provided in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention a mobile phone, including a receiver for receiving a transmitted message, a message parser, coupled with the receiver, for identifying the transmitted message as being an alert request, and at least one speaker, coupled with the message parser, for sounding an audible alert, in response to the message parser identifying the alert request. 
     There is further provided in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention a method for locating a misplaced electronic communication device, including receiving, by an electronic communication device, a transmitted message, identifying, by the electronic communication device, the transmitted message as being an alert request, and in response to the identifying, generating, by the electronic communication device, an alert. 
     There is yet further provided in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention an electronic communication device, including a receiver for receiving a transmitted message a message parser, coupled with the receiver, for identifying the transmitted message as being an alert request, and at least one speaker, coupled with the message parser, for sounding an audible alert in response to the message parser identifying the alert request. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
       The present invention will be more fully understood and appreciated from the following detailed description, taken in conjunction with the drawings in which: 
         FIG. 1  is a simplified flowchart of a method for locating a misplaced phone, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention; and 
         FIG. 2  is a simplified block diagram of a mobile phone with circuitry for generating an alert that aids in locating the phone, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
     Aspects of the present invention relate to locating a misplaced mobile phone. 
     Reference is now made to  FIG. 1 , which is a simplified flowchart of a method for locating a misplace phone, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. The method of  FIG. 1  is performed by a mobile phone. At step  110  the mobile phone receives a transmitted message. At step  120  the mobile phone parses the transmitted message and identifies the message as being an alert request. 
     Generally, an alert request includes a recognizable header and one or more parameter values. A user, at step  10 , sets the parameter values by means of a message editor, such as message editor  201  ( FIG. 2 ), to specify how the mobile phone responds to an alert request. A sample alert request is “LocateMyPhone &lt;personal identification #&gt;&lt;time&gt;&lt;volume&gt;&lt;alert type&gt;”, 
     where 
     
         
         the personal identification # parameter is a unique ID for the user, 
         the time parameter designates a time duration for an audible alert, 
         the volume parameter designates a sound volume for an audible alert, and 
         the alert type parameter designates a sound pattern for an audible alert.
 
A sound pattern may be, for example, a repetitive “3 beeps +silence” pattern, or a rising volume alert that starts with an initial volume and increases the volume over time.
 
       
    
     If the time parameter is not set, then the audible alert may be sounded for a default amount of time, or alternatively may be sounded until manually stopped. If the volume parameter is not set, then the audible alert may be sounded at a default sound volume. If the alert type parameter is not set, then the alert may be sounded according to a default sound pattern. 
     If the transmitted message is identified at step  120  as being an alert request, then at step  130  the mobile phone sounds an audible alert. The time, volume and alert type parameters described above govern the audible alert sounded at step  130 . In addition, at step  140  the mobile phone displays a visible pre-designated message, such as “Please contact John at 123-456-7890” so that whoever finds the phone knows how to contact its owner. The pre-designated message displayed at step  140  may also be set using a parameter value. 
     Optionally, at step  150  the mobile phone may play a pre-designated audio/video recording, in addition to or instead of displaying the pre-designated message at step  140 . As above, the pre-designated audio/video recording may be set using a parameter value. The pre-designated audio/video recording may indicate that the phone is lost, and describe how to contact the phone&#39;s owner. 
     Optionally, the mobile phone may vibrate, so as to assist people in finding it. 
     According to various embodiments of the present invention, the transmitted message received at step  110  may be transmitted at step  20 , by means of a transmitter such as transmitter  202  ( FIG. 2 ), in a number of different ways. The transmitted message may be transmitted inter alia as an SMS message, or as an MMS message. Use of an MMS message facilitates transmission of a pre-designated audio/video recording. 
     The transmitted message may be transmitted via Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) from a mobile phone or from a PDA. 
     The transmitted message may be transmitted via a web server. 
     The transmitted message may be transmitted over a BLUETOOTH® connection, or over a Wi-Fi connection. For BLUETOOTH® transmission, the transmitted message may be sent as a vCard, which generally includes a message in the name field, from a BLUETOOTH® transmitter to the mobile phone using the Object Exchange (OBEX) protocol. BLUETOOTH® generally has a limited range of approximately 10 meters, for transmissions made by a mobile phone, and has a larger range of up to 200 meters for transmissions made by computers with Class 1 transmitters. 
     For Wi-Fi transmission, the transmitted message may be included in a data section of an element of an 802.11 IEEE standard beacon. Beacon element ID 221 in the 802.11 standard is a vendor-specific element and, as such, can be used for adding data to the Wi-Fi protocol. In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, the alert request message may be embedded in the data section of element ID 221, as follows. 
                                           Element ID 221 in 802.11 Beacon                Field   Value                       Element ID   221           Length           OUI   Hex vendor code           Data   Alert request message                        
The field OUI represents a three-octet Organizationally Unique Identifier. For example, the OUI for Microsoft Corporation is 00:50:f2. The OUI is unique for each vendor. It will thus be appreciated by those skilled in the art that for Wi-Fi transmission, step  120  may be performed using an 802.11 protocol sniffer that captures a beacon from a wireless access point, searches for element ID 221, and determines whether or not the data field contains an alert request message.
 
     Reference is now made to  FIG. 2 , which is a simplified block diagram of a mobile phone  200  with circuitry for generating an alert that aids in locating the phone, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. As shown in  FIG. 2 , mobile phone  200  includes a receiver  210 , a message parser  220 , at least one speaker  230 , a display  240  and an optional audio/video player  250 . Receiver  210  receives a transmitted message and forwards the message to message parser  220 . Receiver  210  may be inter alia an SMS message receiver or an MMS message receiver. Receiver  210  may be inter alia a BLUETOOTH® receiver or a Wi-Fi receiver. 
     Message parser  220  receives a message as input, parses the message to determine whether or not the message is an alert request, and generates as output an indicator if the message is an alert request. 
     Speaker(s)  230  receives as input the indicator from message parser  220  and generates as output an audible alert. As indicated hereinabove, the alert request may include parameter values that govern the time duration, sound volume and sound pattern of the audible alert. Display  240  receives as input the indicator from message parser  220 , and generates as output a pre-designated display message. As indicated hereinabove, the pre-designated display message may be a parameter value in the alert request. Audio/video player  250  receives as input the indicator from message parser  220 , and generates as output a pre-designated audio/video recording. 
     In reading the above description, persons skilled in the art will realize that there are many apparent variations that can be applied to the methods and systems described. Thus it may be appreciated from  FIGS. 1 and 2  that embodiments of the present invention are not limited to mobile phones, and apply generally to electronic devices that have communication capability, such as portable digital assistants (PDAs) and pagers. 
     In the foregoing specification, the invention has been described with reference to specific exemplary embodiments thereof. It will, however, be evident that various modifications and changes may be made to the specific exemplary embodiments without departing from the broader spirit and scope of the invention as set forth in the appended claims. Accordingly, the specification and drawings are to be regarded in an illustrative rather than a restrictive sense.