Patent ID: 7860963

Claim:
A service communication control method for providing an application service from a service providing device to a service-user terminal via a service relaying apparatus, wherein a management server is located between the service providing device and the service relaying apparatus, and a portal server is located between the service providing device and the service relaying apparatus, the service communication control method comprising: the management server managing communication control programs provided by service providing devices; the management server managing users who subscribe to services provided by the service providing devices together with program identification information of the communication control programs necessary for the services; the management server reading the communication control program based on the program identification information, and notifying the service relaying apparatus of the communication control program; the portal server managing terminal-attribute information of service-user terminals collected by the service relaying apparatus with respect to each of the users; the portal server managing service information including the program identification information and use condition required to use the service notified by the service providing device; the portal server creating a list of services available for the respective users on the service-user terminals based on the terminal-attribute information and the service information, and displaying the list to allow each user to select a service from the list on the service-user terminal; the service relaying apparatus requesting the service providing device to provide a service in response to a request from the service-user terminal; and the service relaying apparatus relaying communication between the service providing device and the service-user terminal with a protocol corresponding to the service to provide the service to the service-user terminal, wherein the service relaying apparatus requesting includes requesting the service providing device to provide the service when the service-user terminal is an authorized service-user terminal, and the service relaying apparatus includes identifying whether the service-user terminal is an authorized service-user terminal, relaying the communication by one of a plurality of communication control programs that use different protocols for respective service providing devices, specifying the service providing device that has been requested to provide the service to the service-user terminal identified as an authorized service-user terminal; and selecting a communication control program from the communication control programs that is necessary for the communication with the service providing device.