Building system with smart entity personal identifying information (PII) masking

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10417451-B2
Application number	US-201816048052-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jul 27, 2018
Priority date	Sep 27, 2017
Publication date	Sep 17, 2019
Grant date	Sep 17, 2019

Abstract

A building system for operating a building and managing private building information includes a processing circuit configured to receive a request for information for a building entity of a building entity database. The processing circuit is configured to select one of the mask templates from the entity database based on access values associated with the requesting device and a relational link between the building entity and the mask templates, retrieve private information for the building entity in response to a reception of the request for the information, and generate a masked information data structure based on the private information and the one of the mask templates.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A building system for operating a building and managing private building information, the building system comprising a processing circuit configured to:
receive, from a device, a request for information for a building entity of a building entity database, wherein the building entity database comprises the building entity, a plurality of mask templates, and a relational link between the building entity and the plurality of mask templates, wherein each of the plurality of mask templates provides different access to private information of the building entity and is linked to one combination of a plurality of access values;
select one of the plurality of mask templates from the building entity database based on a particular combination of the plurality of access values and the relational link between the building entity and the plurality of mask templates;
retrieve, from the building entity database, the private information for the building entity in response to a reception of the request for the information from the device; and
generate a masked information data structure based on the private information and the one of the plurality of mask templates.

2. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to operate one or more pieces of building equipment to operate the building based on the masked information data structure.

3. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to select the one of the plurality of mask templates by selecting the one of the plurality of mask templates as a function of the plurality of access values.

4. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to select the one of the plurality of mask templates by selecting the one of the plurality of mask templates based on the particular combination of the plurality of access values by identifying the one of the plurality of mask templates linked to the particular combination of the plurality of access values.

5. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to:
determine whether the request for the information is a first request for the private information or a second request for public information; and
retrieve, from the building entity database, the public information and provide the public information to the device without masking in response to a determination that the request for the information is the second request for the public information;
wherein the processing circuit is configured to retrieve, from the building entity database, the private information for the building entity in response to the reception of the request from the device for the information and in response to a determination that the request for the information is the first request for the private information;
wherein the processing circuit is configured to generate the masked information data structure based on the retrieved private information and the selected one of the plurality of mask templates in response to the determination that the request for the information is the first request for the private information.

6. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the private information comprises a plurality of attributes of the building entity;
wherein each of the plurality of mask templates comprises a plurality of masking operators, one of the plurality of masking operators associated with each of the plurality of attributes;
wherein the plurality of masking operators comprise at least one of:
a first masking operator configured to replace one or more values of a particular attribute with a particular masking character;
a second masking operator configured to show the particular attribute in the clear;
a third masking operator configured to show only a particular number of a plurality of values of the particular attribute; or
a fourth masking operator configured to apply a particular encryption method on the particular attribute.

7. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of access values comprise at least one of:
role information of a user of the device, wherein the role information indicates a permission level of the user;
a device type of the device;
a geographic location of the device;
an application of the device associated with generating the request for the information; or
a vertical identifying a business use associated with the device.

8. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to:
receive a mask template request from a second system, the second system configured to store the private information and mask the private information based on a mask template received from the building system;
select a second mask template of the plurality of mask templates based on the mask template request received from the second system; and
send the second mask template to the second system for masking, by the second system, the private information stored by the second system.

9. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to generate an access hash key based on the plurality of access values;
wherein the processing circuit is configured to select the one of the plurality of mask templates from the building entity database based on the particular combination of the plurality of access values by selecting the one of the plurality of mask templates with the access hash key, wherein each of the plurality of mask templates is associated with a particular value of the access hash key.

10. The building system of claim 9 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to generate the access hash key by concatenating the plurality of access values and hashing the concatenated plurality of access values to generate the access hash key.

11. The building system of claim 1 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to:
determine a transitive closure for the building entity database based on a set of entities of the building entity database and a set of relational links between entities of the set of entities, the set of entities comprising at least the building entity, the plurality of mask templates, and the private information; and
update the building entity database based on the transitive closure by adding additional relational links between the entities of the set of entities, the additional relational links comprising at least one of the relational link between the building entity and the plurality of mask templates and a second relational link between the building entity and the private information;
wherein the processing circuit is configured to retrieve the private information for the building entity in response to the reception of the request for the information based on the relational link between the building entity and the private information.

12. The building system of claim 11 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to:
receive new entity data, the new entity data comprising at least one of a new building entity and a first new link between the new building entity and at least one of the entities of the set of entities, new private information and a second new link between the new private information and at least one of the entities of the set of entities, or new mask templates and a third new link between the new mask templates and at least one of the entities of the set of entities;
add the new entity data to the building entity database;
determine the transitive closure of the building entity database based on the set of entities, the set of relational links, and the new entity data added to the building entity database; and
update the building entity database by u

Assignees

• Johnson Controls Tech Co

Inventors

• Park Youngchoon
• Sinha Sudhi R

Classifications

• G05B2219/2642

  Domotique, domestic, home control, automation, smart house · CPC title

• G05B2219/2614

  HVAC, heating, ventillation, climate control · CPC title

• G06F16/2379

  Updates performed during online database operations; commit processing · CPC title

• G06F16/2255

  Hash tables · CPC title

• G05B15/02 Primary

  electric · CPC title