Patent ID: 8229394

Claim:
A method for tracking usage of a network by a plurality of users of a mobile phone, the method comprising: associating a plurality of user accounts with the mobile phone, wherein each of the plurality of user accounts corresponds to a different one of the plurality of users of the mobile phone; receiving a first log-on request provided by a first one of the plurality of users of the mobile phone; receiving a second log-on request provided by a second one of the plurality of users of the mobile phone; establishing respective wireless wide-area network communication connections as being associated with one of first and second ones of the plurality of user accounts; storing usage units associated with the respective wireless wide-area network communication connections established by the mobile phone, the usage units including corresponding times of the communication connections; automatically attributing usage of the network by the mobile phone to the first and second ones of the plurality of user accounts responsive to the first and second log-on requests, respectively, by correlating the stored usage units for the communication connections to the first and second ones of the plurality of user accounts based on respective times of receipt of the first and second log-on requests and the times of the communication connections; and automatically calculating respective charges for the first and second ones of the plurality of user accounts based on the usage attributed to the first and second ones of the plurality of user accounts, wherein the first and second log-on requests include identifying information for the first and second ones of the plurality of users, respectively, and wherein establishing the respective wireless wide-area network communication connections as being associated with one of the first and second ones of the plurality of user accounts comprises: receiving one of the first and second log-on requests including the identifying information from a current user of the mobile phone via a user interface of the mobile phone; authenticating the current user as one of the first and second ones of the plurality of users based on the identifying information; establishing the respective wireless wide-area network communication connections including the respective usage units associated therewith as being associated with the one of the first and second ones of the plurality of user accounts corresponding to the current user; and then receiving a log off request from the current user of the mobile phone via the user interface of the mobile phone, wherein automatically attributing the usage comprises automatically attributing a sum of the usage units between receiving the one of the first and second log-on requests and receiving the log off request to the corresponding one of the first and second ones of the plurality of user accounts as the usage of the network.