Patent ID: 6996211

Claim:
A method for providing caller identification information, the method comprising: before completing a call initiated at a calling telephony device for a called telephony device, determining if caller identification information for the calling telephony device can be provided; obtaining the caller identification information and communicating the caller identification information to the called telephony device via a connectionless protocol where continuing connection does not exist between communicating end points if the caller identification information can be provided; if the caller identification information can not be provided, prompting the calling party associated with the calling telephony device via the connectionless protocol to provide spoken caller identification information, including prompting the calling party to record a name; storing data representative of the name; converting the stored data into a plurality of data packets with each data packet including an Internet address of a source node and an Internet address of a destination node; and transmitting the data packets in a random order from a gateway computer associated with the calling telephony device to a gateway computer associated with the called telephony device; and communicating the spoken caller identification information via a plurality of data packets to the called telephony device.