Patent ID: 8185534

Claim:
A system comprising: an instruction store configured to store machine-executable instructions; an instruction processor configured to execute at least a portion of the machine-executable instructions stored in the instruction store; a source record accumulator configured to obtain a plurality of source records from a plurality of source record databases, wherein the plurality of source records include information regarding a common entity; a consolidated record generator configured to generate a consolidated record including selected information regarding the common entity, wherein the selected information is obtained from the plurality of source records; and a consolidated identifier engine including: (a) a prefix engine configured to obtain identifier prefix values that are different for each of the plurality of source record databases; (b) a source identifier engine configured to obtain a plurality of source record identifiers that are stored in the source record databases and are associated with the plurality of source records; (c) a candidate identifier engine configured to determine an ordered set of candidate consolidation identifiers based on prepending identifier prefix values to the source record identifiers, wherein the identifier prefix values prepended to the source record identifiers are based on identification of the source record databases that include the source record identifiers; (d) an identifier selection engine configured to determine a consolidated record identifier based on selecting an extreme value of the set of candidate consolidation identifiers; and (e) a consolidated identifier storage engine configured to store the consolidated record identifier in association with the consolidated record in a consolidated record database for identification and retrieval of the consolidated record.