Patent ID: 7739082

Claim:
A method for detecting anomalies in a first plurality of observations, comprising: applying one or more formatting processes to the first plurality of observations to generate formatted data; generating a mathematical model based on said formatted data by iteratively decomposing a fully dependent model, the model indicating conditional independence relationships betweens aspects of the observations; calculating one or more joint probability distributions based on the relationships indicated by said model using said formatted data; generating scored data by applying a second plurality of observations to said model; and analyzing said scored data to detect said one or more anomalies wherein said formatting processes include a discrete decomposition of at least one variable of said first plurality of observations and wherein said discrete decomposition is a method of data representation comprising decomposing a continuous variable into a collection of discrete variables corresponding to a series of intervals, wherein each interval corresponds to a range of values of the continuous variable and a plurality of the intervals at least partially overlap.