Systems and methods for automatically blocking the use of tracking tools

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11444976-B2
Application number	US-202117387421-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jul 28, 2021
Priority date	Jul 28, 2020
Publication date	Sep 13, 2022
Grant date	Sep 13, 2022

Abstract

Embodiments of the present invention provide methods, apparatus, systems, computing devices, computing entities, and/or the like for permitting or blocking tracking tools used through webpages. In particular embodiments, the method involves: scanning a webpage to identify a tracking tool configured for processing personal data; determining a data destination location that is associated with the tracking tool; and generating program code configured to: determine a location associated with a user who is associated with a rendering of the webpage; determine a prohibited data destination location based on the location associated with the user; determine that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is not the prohibited data destination location; and responsive to the data destination location associated with the tracking tool not being the prohibited data destination location, permit the tracking tool to execute.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method comprising:
scanning, by computing hardware, a webpage to identify a tracking tool that is associated with the webpage and configured for processing personal data;
determining, by the computing hardware, a data destination location that is associated with the tracking tool, wherein the determining step is based on at least one of (a) a location for a computing device that invokes the tracking tool, (b) a location of a computing device that receives the personal data, or (c) a location of a computing device or a storage device that stores the personal data; and
generating, by the computing hardware, program code, wherein the program code is configured to:
determine a location associated with a user who is associated with a rendering of the webpage;
determine a prohibited data destination location based on a data structure mapping the location associated with the user to the prohibited data destination location;
determine that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is not the prohibited data destination location; and
responsive to determining that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is not the prohibited data destination location, permit the tracking tool to execute.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the program code is further configured to:
determine a second location associated with a second user who is associated with a second rendering of the webpage;
determine a second prohibited data destination location based on the data structure mapping the second location associated with the second user to the second prohibited data destination location;
determine that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is the second prohibited data destination location; and
responsive to determining that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is the second prohibited data destination location, perform at least one of disabling the tracking tool from executing, or disabling functionality of the tracking tool configured for processing the personal data from executing.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising generating, by the computing hardware, a computer-readable file comprising an identifier for the tracking tool and an identifier for the data destination location associated with the tracking tool, wherein the program code comprises the computer-readable file and is configured to identify the data destination location associated with the tracking tool from the computer-readable file.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the program code is configured to determine the location associated with the user who is associated with the rendering of the webpage based on at least one of (a) a geographical location of the user, (b) a network address associated with the user, (c) browser information on the user, (d) a language associated with the user, or (e) consent data associated with the user.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the program code comprises a script configured to run on the webpage and execute during a rendering of the webpage.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein scanning the webpage to identify the tracking tool associated with the webpage involves:
analyzing a loading of the webpage to identify a source script used to invoke the tracking tool;
analyzing the source script to identify data associated with the tracking tool; and
comparing the data associated with the tracking tool to data on a plurality of known tracking tools to identify the tracking tool.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein determining the data destination location associated with the tracking tool comprises identifying the location of the computing device that invokes the tracking tool, the location of the computing device that receives the personal data based on the data associated with the tracking tool, or the location of the computing device or the storage device that stores the personal data based on the data associated with the tracking tool and data on the plurality of known tracking tools.

8. A system comprising:
a server comprising
a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions; and
a processing device communicatively coupled to the non-transitory computer-readable medium,
wherein, the processing device is configured to execute the instructions and thereby perform operations comprising:
receiving a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) request to render a webpage; and
responsive to receiving the HTTP request, sending a HTTP response comprising a script to a computing device associated with a user; and

the computing device, wherein the computing device is configured to execute, within a browser and during a rendering of the webpage, the script to perform additional operations comprising:
identifying a source script attempting to execute;
identifying the source script is configured to invoke a tracking tool configured for processing personal data based on information on the tracking tool found in a file embedded in the script; and
responsive to identifying the source script is configured to invoke the tracking tool:
determining a location associated with the user;
determining a prohibited data destination location based on a data structure mapping the location associated with the user to the prohibited data destination location;
determining a data destination location associated with the tracking tool based on the information on the tracking tool found in the file embedded in the script;
determining that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is not the prohibited data destination location; and
responsive to determining that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is not the prohibited data destination location, permitting the source script to execute to invoke the tracking tool for the webpage that is rendered on the browser.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the operations performed by the server further comprise:
receiving a second Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) request to render the webpage; and
responsive to receiving the second HTTP request, sending a second HTTP response comprising the script to a second browser executing on a second computing device associated with a second user, wherein the script is executable during a second rendering of the webpage to:
determine a second location associated with the second user;
determine a second prohibited data destination location based on the data structure mapping the second location associated with the second user to the second prohibited data destination location;
determine the data destination location associated with the tracking tool based on the information on the tracking tool found in the file embedded in the script;
determine that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is the second prohibited data destination location; and
responsive to determining that the data destination location associated with the tracking tool is the second prohibited data destination location, prevent the source script from executing to prohibit the tracking tool from executing for the webpage.

10. The system of claim 8 , wherein the operations performed by the server further comprise:
receiving a second Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) request to render the webpage; and
responsive to receiving the second HTTP request, sending a second HTTP response comprising the script to a second browser executing on a second computing device associated with a second user, wherein the script is executable during a second rendering of the webpage to:
determine a second location associated with the second user;
determine a second prohibited data destination location

Assignees

• Onetrust Llc

Inventors

• Brannon Jonathan Blake
• Whitney Patrick
• Chavva Sharath Chandra
• Baucom Jeffrey

Classifications

• H04L67/02

  based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP] · CPC title

• H04L67/535

  Tracking the activity of the user (network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34) · CPC title

• G06F16/9577

  Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents · CPC title

• H04L63/1416

  Event detection, e.g. attack signature detection · CPC title

• H04L63/1475 Primary

  Passive attacks, e.g. eavesdropping or listening without modification of the traffic monitored · CPC title