Patent ID: 7264154

Claim:
A computer system for approving a commercial transaction between a user with account information and a merchant, said computer system comprising: a processing unit for processing data and code; and memory for storing said data and said code, said data and said code together including a merchant communications module operative to facilitate a connection with said merchant for receiving a transaction approval request, activation data accessible to an account-holder, said activation data indicative of the activation status of an account associated with said account-holder and with said account information, and an authorization module responsive to said transaction approval request and operative to deny said transaction approval request if said account associated with said account-holder is deactivated; whereby prior to said user initiating said transaction with said merchant said account-holder can modify said activation data to activate said account, thereby facilitating approval of said transaction approval request; subsequent to approval of said transaction approval request, said account-holder can modify said activation data to deactivate said account such that subsequent transaction approval requests will be denied; and prior to said user initiating a future transaction using said account information, said account-holder can again modify said activation data to facilitate approval of a transaction approval request associated with said future transaction, thereby allowing said card-holder to deactivate said account between each future transaction.