Patent ID: 7370011

Claim:
An information portal system comprising: a means for authenticating a user attempting to log onto a portal server; web page means for presenting to the user, from the portal system, and responsive to successful login by the user, a link to an institution server, the link providing the institution server an identification of the user at the portal server, and responsive to activation by the user of the link, the link enabling the user to authenticate itself with the institution server based upon user-institution authentication data, the authentication of the user with the institution server resulting in authorization of the portal system to receive user data from the institution; means for initiating establishment of a portal-institution interface for enabling the portal server to authenticate itself with the institution server using portal-institution authentication data, the portal-institution authentication data different from the user-institution authentication data, and to receive the user data if the authentication of the user with the institution server was successful; means for displaying at least a portion of the user data to the user; and means for receiving input, from the user, describing an action to be performed on the user data, the action selectable, by the user, from a first set of actions presented to the user by the portal system.