Patent ID: 8316128

Claim:
A communication management system, comprising: a computer appliance associated with a particular user; a data repository coupled to the computer appliance storing a directory of contact identities; a zone manager enabling the user to create one or more zones defined each by a business or a social activity, to associate specific contact identities with individual ones of the zones created, and to create management policies associated with and specific to each zone created; and an identity/zone firewall, comprising an identity analyzer analyzing and validating identities detected, the firewall acting as an enforcer of management policies and serving as a gateway at the computer appliance through which incoming and outgoing communications pass; wherein individual incoming or outgoing communications are associated at the identity/zone firewall with a zone, by one or both of identities of sender and receiver and message content, and the management policies specific to that zone are enforced before the communications are allowed to pass.