Patent ID: 8768876

Claim:
A system for using location data to infer a place name of a user, wherein the system is configured to receive location readings and sensor data from multiple mobile devices wirelessly coupled to a network, the system comprising: at least one data storage device for storing a place database, reference data, a sequence of location readings, and sensor data, wherein the place database includes place information and corresponding geo-location data, wherein the reference data links a user or a user's mobile device to a proposed place at an instance of time, and wherein the sequence of location readings includes latitude and longitude coordinate data and an associated time; at least one server coupled to the data storage device, wherein the server is configured to: classify a sliding window of N contiguous location readings over the sequence of location readings as moving or not moving, wherein N is an integer number of location readings; segment the sequence of location readings into two or more location clusters; identify a centroid or sub-centroids of each of the two or more location clusters; query the place database to identify two or more candidate places that are within a predetermined radius of the centroid of the cluster; extract a feature from the candidate places, wherein the feature includes a place category, popularity, or hours of operation; and calculate a probability that the user is located at each of the candidate places, wherein the probability is based on features of the candidate places.