Patent ID: 7027645

Claim:
A computer based method for filtering a web page for objectionable content, the web page available from the World Wide Web and having a URL address, text words and at least one graphic image file comprising a number of pixels each having spectral components defined in accordance with a color model, the method comprising steps of: (a) providing a list of marker terms; (b) comparing a requested URL for a selected web page with the list of marker terms and disallowing display of the selected web page when at least one term in the requested URL appears in the list of marker terms; (c) comparing the text words from the selected web page to the list of marker terms and disallowing display of the selected web page when at least one of the text words appears in the list of marker terms; (d) evaluating a graphic image file in the selected web page for the presence of objectionable visual content by evaluating relative weighting of the spectral components of each pixel in turn to classify each said pixel as either not representing human skin or as possibly representing human skin; (e) allowing display of the selected web page when each said pixel is classified as not representing human skin; (f) counting a number v of graphic image files in the selected web page; (g) performing the evaluating step (d) on each of the v of graphic image files in turn; (h) identifying a subset w of the v graphic image files having at least one pixel classified as possibly representing human skin; and (i) displaying the selected web page when w is less than a selected percentage of v.