Systems and methods for discovering social accounts

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11645341-B2
Application number	US-202117537019-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Nov 29, 2021
Priority date	Apr 17, 2012
Publication date	May 9, 2023
Grant date	May 9, 2023

Abstract

Methods and systems allow organizations to discover accounts, subscriptions, properties, sites and other online portals within each distinct social network platform and across disparate social network platforms, publishing platforms and networks that represent, claim to represent or are relevant to their organization and/or brands based on search terms and facilitate the statistical reporting and analysis of activities on the discovered properties.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method, comprising:
receiving or obtaining, by a computer, a search string containing terms and a probabilistic weighting that indicates strength of a relationship between the terms, one of the terms associated with a user or an entity;
formatting, by the computer, the terms as required by disparate social network platforms;
querying, by the computer, the disparate social network platforms on the terms;
processing, by the computer, responses from the disparate social network platforms, the processing including identifying metadata that is common across the responses from the disparate social network platforms;
storing, by the computer, the metadata in a normalized format in a data store;
providing, by the computer through a user interface, the responses from the disparate social network platforms to a user device, the user interface including a filter function;
receiving, by the computer through the user interface, an instruction to apply the filter function to the responses from a subset of the disparate social network platforms;
applying, by the computer, the filter function to the responses from the subset of the disparate social network platforms;
providing, by the computer through the user interface based on a result from the applying, a number of properties within each of the subset of the disparate social network platforms;
receiving, by the computer through the user interface, an indication that a subset of the number of properties has been selected;
obtaining, by the computer, publicly available content associated with the subset of the number of properties; and
providing, by the computer, the publicly available content associated with the subset of the number of properties to the user device.

2. The method according to claim 1 , further comprising:
automatically executing pre-defined and stored query strings on a periodic basis, each of the query strings containing a term associated with the user or the entity, wherein the automatically executing comprises querying the disparate social network platforms on the term associated with the user or the entity.

3. The method according to claim 1 , further comprising:
classifying the responses from the disparate social network platforms.

4. The method according to claim 3 , wherein the classifying comprises applying automatic classification through machine learning of a frequency of term appearance in the metadata, a term location in the metadata, or a combination thereof.

5. The method according to claim 1 , further comprising:
filtering the responses from the disparate social network platforms by combining, based on categories, platform-specific sources, or classifications, the responses from the disparate social network platforms or a portion thereof with prior search results or groupings of prior search results.

6. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the filter function limits the number of properties based on an activity date, an activity level, a term inclusion, a term exclusion, a topical relevance to the user or the entity, or a combination thereof.

7. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the data store is specific to the user or the entity.

8. A system, comprising:
a processor;
a non-transitory computer-readable medium; and
stored instructions translatable by the processor for:
receiving or obtaining a search string containing terms and a probabilistic weighting that indicates strength of a relationship between the terms, one of the terms associated with a user or an entity;
formatting the terms as required by disparate social network platforms;
querying the disparate social network platforms on the terms;
processing responses from the disparate social network platforms, the processing including identifying metadata that is common across the responses from the disparate social network platforms;
storing the metadata in a normalized format in a data store;
providing, through a user interface, the responses from the disparate social network platforms to a user device, the user interface including a filter function;
receiving, through the user interface, an instruction to apply the filter function to the responses from a subset of the disparate social network platforms;
applying the filter function to the responses from the subset of the disparate social network platforms;
providing, through the user interface based on a result from the applying, a number of properties within each of the subset of the disparate social network platforms;
receiving, through the user interface, an indication that a subset of the number of properties has been selected;
obtaining publicly available content associated with the subset of the number of properties; and
providing the publicly available content associated with the subset of the number of properties to the user device.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the stored instructions are further translatable by the processor for:
automatically executing pre-defined and stored query strings on a periodic basis, each of the query strings containing a term associated with the user or the entity, wherein the automatically executing comprises querying the disparate social network platforms on the term associated with the user or the entity.

10. The system of claim 8 , wherein the stored instructions are further translatable by the processor for:
classifying the responses from the disparate social network platforms.

11. The system of claim 10 , wherein the classifying comprises applying automatic classification through machine learning of a frequency of term appearance in the metadata, a term location in the metadata, or a combination thereof.

12. The system of claim 8 , wherein the stored instructions are further translatable by the processor for:
filtering the responses from the disparate social network platforms by combining, based on categories, platform-specific sources, or classifications, the responses from the disparate social network platforms or a portion thereof with prior search results or groupings of prior search results.

13. The system of claim 8 , wherein the filter function limits the number of properties based on an activity date, an activity level, a term inclusion, a term exclusion, a topical relevance to the user or the entity, or a combination thereof.

14. The system of claim 8 , wherein the data store is specific to the user or the entity.

15. A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions translatable by a processor for:
receiving or obtaining a search string containing terms and a probabilistic weighting that indicates strength of a relationship between the terms, one of the terms associated with a user or an entity;
formatting the terms as required by disparate social network platforms;
querying the disparate social network platforms on the terms;
processing responses from the disparate social network platforms, the processing including identifying metadata that is common across the responses from the disparate social network platforms;
storing the metadata in a normalized format in a data store;
providing, through a user interface, the responses from the disparate social network platforms to a user device, the user interface including a filter function;
receiving, through the user interface, an instruction to apply the filter function to the responses from a subset of the disparate social network platforms;
applying the filter function to the responses from the subset of the disparate social network platforms;
providing, through the user interface based on a r

Assignees

• Proofpoint Inc

Inventors

• Redmond Devin
• Kruck Ray
• Sutton Richard
• Dorie Anthony

Classifications

• G06F16/951 Primary

  Indexing; Web crawling techniques · CPC title

• G06F16/9536 Primary

  Search customisation based on social or collaborative filtering · CPC title