Patent ID: 8635295

Claim:
A method for tracking changes in documents exchanged over email applications, the method comprising: identifying, by a processor implementing a compare service, a first file attached to a first email received via an email application; comparing, by the compare service, a first identifier associated with the first file to identifiers associated with one or more files previously transmitted via the email application; identifying a second file from the one or more previously transmitted files that corresponds to the first identifier; comparing the first file and the second file to identify one or more changes made to contents of the first file in relation to the second file; upon identifying at least one change in the first file, displaying a visual indicator in the email application in relation to an indicator of the first email; prior to transmitting a given email via the email application, identifying, by the compare service, presence of a given file attachment to the given email; upon identifying the given file attachment, attaching, by the compare service, a given tag to the given file attachment prior to the email application transmitting the given email; maintaining, by the compare service, a compare database, wherein the compare database includes one or more tags identifying corresponding files transmitted via the email application; and maintaining, by the compare service, a copy of the corresponding files for use in later comparison steps.