Maintaining a limited user profile for social networking system users unable to establish a user profile

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016014134-A1
Application number	US-201414329670-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Jul 11, 2014
Priority date	Jul 11, 2014
Publication date	Jan 14, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

A social networking system maintains a limited user profile associated with a user of the social networking system who does not satisfy one or more criteria for the social networking system to maintain a user profile. The limited user profile includes information describing the user and allows the user to be associated with limited types of interactions with the social networking system. An administrator is associated with the limited user profile and may modify information associated with the limited user profile as well as authorize or deny interactions involving the limited user profile. When the user satisfies criteria for the social networking system maintaining a user profile, the social networking system generates a user profile based on information in the limited user profile and prior interactions involving the limited user profile.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A method comprising:
receiving a request from a user of a social networking system to create a limited user profile for an additional user that does not satisfy one or more criteria for maintaining a user profile via the social networking system; identifying one or more permissions associated with the limited user profile for the additional user by the user, the identified one or more permissions specifying fewer permissions than associated with a user profile maintained by the social networking system; determining one or more privacy settings associated with the limited user profile for the additional user by the user, a privacy setting associated with a type of interaction with the limited user profile and identifying a user capable of authorizing the type of interaction with the limited user profile; generating the limited user profile for the additional user based at least in part on information included in the request, the identified one or more permissions, and the determined one or more privacy settings; and storing the limited user profile for the additional user and a connection between the limited user profile for the additional user and the user.

2 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a request from a requesting user of the social networking system to associate the additional user with content maintained by the social networking system; identifying a user capable of authorizing association of the additional user with content maintained by the social networking system from the one or more privacy settings; communicating information describing the received request to associate the additional user with content maintained by the social networking system to the identified user; and associating the additional user with the content maintained by the social networking system if the identified user approves the request to associate the additional user with content maintained by the social networking system.

3 . The method of claim 2 , wherein communicating information describing the received request to the identified user comprises:
determining whether the requesting user is connected to the additional user associated with the limited user profile; and communicating the information describing the received request to associate the additional user with content maintained by the social networking system to the identified user in response to determining the requesting user is connected to the additional user associated with the limited user profile.

4 . The method of claim 3 , wherein communicating information describing the received request to the user associated with the limited user profile associated with the additional user further comprises:
denying the received request to associate the additional user with content maintained by the social networking system in response to determining the requesting user is not connected to the additional user associated with the limited user profile.

5 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a request from the user associated with the limited user profile associated with the additional user to associate the additional user with content maintained by the social networking system; and associating the additional user with the content maintained by the social networking system.

6 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a request from a requesting user of the social networking system to establish a connection with the additional user; identifying a user capable of authorizing the connection with the additional user from the one or more privacy settings; communicating information describing the received request to establish the connection with the additional user to the identified user; and establishing the connection between the requesting user and the additional user if the identified user approves the request to establish the connection with the additional user.

7 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a request from a requesting user of the social networking system to receive content associated with the additional user and maintained by the social networking system; identifying a user capable of authorizing the requesting user to receive content associated with the additional user from the one or more privacy settings; communicating information describing the received request to receive content associated with the additional user to the identified user; and presenting content associated with the additional user to the requesting user if the identified user authorizes the request to receive content associated with the additional user.

8 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving an identification of one or more additional permissions to associate with the limited user profile from the user; and associating the additional permissions with the limited user profile.

9 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the information included in the request is selected from a group consisting of: a name of the additional user, an age of the additional user, a gender of the additional user, one or more events associated with the additional user, a description of the additional user, and any combination thereof.

10 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the one or more privacy settings associated with the limited user profile are associated with information selected from a group consisting of: information identifying one or more users receiving a notification the additional user has been associated with content maintained by the social networking system, identification identifying one or more users capable of authorizing an association between the limited user profile associated with the additional user and content maintained by the social networking system, information identifying one or more users capable of authorizing a connection to the limited user profile associated with the additional user, information identifying data associated with the limited user profile associated with the additional user presented along with content associated with the additional user, information identifying one or more users capable of authorizing a request to receive content associated with the additional user associated with the limited user profile, and any combination thereof.

11 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
responsive to determining the additional user subsequently satisfies criteria for maintaining a user profile via the social networking system, generating a user profile associated with the additional user based at least in part on the limited user profile associated with the additional user, one or more associations between the limited user profile and content maintained by the additional user, and one or more connections between the limited user profile and users of the social networking system.

12 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
prompting the user of the social networking system to create a limited user profile for the additional user based on a characteristic determined of the additional user by application of a face analysis algorithm on an image of the additional user.

13 . The method of claim 12 , wherein the characteristic is determined from a group consisting of: age, gender, relationship status, work history, academic history, location, timestamps, and any combination thereof.

14 . A computer program product comprising a computer readable storage medium having instructions encoded thereon that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to:
receive a request from a user of a social networking system to create a limited user prof

Assignees

• Facebook Inc

Inventors

• Holson Benjamin Michael
• Barak Dan

Classifications

• H04L67/306

  User profiles · CPC title

• H04L63/102 Primary

  Entity profiles · CPC title

• H04L63/20

  for managing network security; network security policies in general (filtering policies H04L63/0227) · CPC title

• H04L63/0892

  by using authentication-authorization-accounting [AAA] servers or protocols · CPC title

• G06Q10/40

  Business processes related to social networking or social networking services · CPC title