Patent ID: 6850913

Claim:
A method for permitting a person to request certification information with the aid of a certification symbol that has been allocated to a resource by a certifying organization, the certification symbol having a check region, said method comprising the steps of: (a) using a web browser of an Internet access device, together with a web address specified in an address field of the check region of the certification symbol, to access a web-server arrangement of the certifying organization over the Internet, and to enter a specific identification number that appears in an ID field of the check region into an input box on a web page received from the web-server arrangement, the Internet access device being operated by the person requesting certification information; (b) transmitting the identification number to the web-server arrangement over the Internet; (c) formulating a database search request based on the identification number and transmitting the database search request to a database that is coupled to the web-server arrangement, the database search request being formulated by the web-server arrangement; (d) reading certification information associated with the identification number out of the database; and (e) transmitting the certification information over the Internet from the web-server arrangement to the Internet access device.