Methods to discover, configure, and leverage relationships in internet of things (IoT) networks

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9900171-B2
Application number	US-201414187102-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Feb 21, 2014
Priority date	Feb 25, 2013
Publication date	Feb 20, 2018
Grant date	Feb 20, 2018

Abstract

The disclosure generally relates to various methods to discover, configure, and leverage relationships in Internet of Things (IoT) networks. More particularly, the methods disclosed herein may support automated processes to create configurable sub-divisions and access controls in an IoT network based on usage associated with objects that are registered in the IoT network and interactions among the registered objects. Furthermore, in one embodiment, relationships between IoT devices that belong to different users may be implicitly discovered and/or ranked based on meetings (e.g., interactions) between the IoT devices, and relationships between the different users may likewise be implicitly discovered and/or ranked. Moreover, locations and interactions associated with IoT devices may be tracked over time to further discover user-specific and potentially asymmetric relationships among the IoT devices and/or the users associated therewith (e.g., where one user considers another user a close friend and the other user considers the first user an acquaintance).

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for discovering, configuring, and leveraging relationships in Internet of Things (IoT) networks, comprising:
registering, by a processor, one or more objects into an IoT network;
tracking, by the processor, interactions among multiple IoT devices and locations where the tracked interactions occurred, wherein the multiple IoT devices include at least a first IoT device that belongs to an owner user associated with the IoT network and a second IoT device that belongs to at least one visitor user to the IoT network, and wherein the tracked interactions include at least one interaction between the second IoT device that belongs to the at least one visitor user and the one or more registered objects in the IoT network;
forming, by the processor, the one or more registered objects into one or more IoT groups according to usage associated with the one or more registered objects and one or more interactions among the tracked interactions that involve the one or more registered objects;
discovering, by the processor, an asymmetric relationship between the owner user associated with the IoT network and the at least one visitor user to the IoT network based on the tracked interactions and the locations associated therewith, including one or more interactions between the first IoT device that belongs to the owner user and the second IoT device that belongs to the at least one visitor user, wherein the asymmetric relationship is discovered based on data associated with the tracked interactions that occurred during a predefined time period;
assigning, by the processor, an identifier to the asymmetric relationship between the owner user and the at least one visitor user based on one or more of a time when the one or more interactions occurred or a location where the one or more interactions occurred;
assigning, by the processor, a rank to a relationship between the first IoT device and the second IoT device based on one or more attributes associated with the one or more interactions and one or more attributes associated with the second IoT device;
updating, by the processor, the rank assigned to the relationship between the first IoT device and the second IoT device in response to one or more subsequent interactions between the first IoT device and the second IoT device, wherein the rank assigned to the relationship is updated based on the one or more attributes associated with the one or more interactions, the one or more attributes associated with the second IoT device, and one or more attributes associated with the one or more subsequent interactions; and
controlling, by the processor, access that the second IoT device that belongs to the at least one visitor user has to each of the one or more IoT groups in the IoT network according to one or more permissions associated with the identifier assigned to the asymmetric relationship between the owner user and the at least one visitor user, wherein controlling the access comprises determining, by the processor, whether to grant the second IoT device access to the first IoT device based on the updated rank assigned to the relationship between the first IoT device and the second IoT device.

2. The method recited in claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving one or more user commands that control access to the one or more IoT groups.

3. The method recited in claim 2 , further comprising:
dividing the one or more IoT groups into one or more subsets according to the usage associated with the one or more registered objects and the one or more interactions among the tracked interactions that involve the one or more registered objects.

4. The method recited in claim 3 , further comprising:
receiving one or more user commands that control access to the one or more subsets.

5. The method recited in claim 1 , wherein the one or more registered objects include at least one non-communicating physical object and at least one communicating IoT device that stores information relating to the usage and the interactions associated therewith in a local database.

6. The method recited in claim 5 , further comprising:
receiving, from the at least one communicating IoT device, the information relating to the usage and the interactions associated therewith; and
deriving information relating to the usage and the interactions associated with the at least one non-communicating physical object based on the information received from the at least one communicating IoT device in response to the interactions associated with the at least one communicating IoT device including at least one interaction between the at least one communicating IoT device and the at least one non-communicating physical object.

7. The method recited in claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving one or more user commands to customize the one or more IoT groups.

8. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining whether to grant the second IoT device access to another IoT device that belongs to the owner user based on the updated rank assigned to the relationship between the first IoT device and the second IoT device.

9. The method recited in claim 1 , further comprising:
storing information related to the one or more interactions between the first IoT device that belongs to the owner user and the second IoT device that belongs to the at least one visitor user in a first interaction table associated with the first IoT device, wherein the information stored in the first interaction table comprises one or more of the time when the one or more interactions occurred or the location where the one or more interactions occurred; and
assigning the identifier to the asymmetric relationship between the owner user and the at least one visitor user associated with the second IoT device based, at least in part, on the information stored in the first interaction table.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the one or more interactions include at least one interaction that occurred while the first IoT device and the second IoT device are located in proximity to each other.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein the first IoT device detects the at least one interaction in response to detecting the second IoT device in proximity thereto.

12. The method of claim 10 , wherein a server detects the at least one interaction based on location information related to the at least one interaction that the server receives from the first IoT device and the second IoT device.

13. The method of claim 9 , further comprising:
adding the identifier assigned to the asymmetric relationship between the owner user and the at least one visitor user to an entry associated with the at least one visitor user in the first interaction table.

14. The method of claim 9 , wherein the asymmetric relationship reflects multiple interactions between one or more IoT devices associated with the owner user and one or more IoT devices associated with the at least one visitor user.

15. The method of claim 14 , wherein the multiple interactions comprise one or more of interactions that occur within a threshold time period, interactions that occur at substantially the same time, interactions that occur at substantially the same location, interactions that have a threshold duration, interactions that have a threshold frequency, or interactions that have substantially the same type.

16. The method recited in claim 1 , wherein the asymmetric relationship indicates that the owner user and the at least one visitor user assign different identifiers to the relationship between the at least one visitor user and the owner user.

Assignees

• Qualcomm Inc

Inventors

• Guedalia Isaac David
• Guedalia Jacob
• Chandhok Ravinder Paul
• Glickfield Sarah

Classifications

• H04W84/18

  Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks · CPC title

• H04W4/08

  User group management · CPC title

• H04W4/023

  using mutual or relative location information between multiple location based services [LBS] targets or of distance thresholds · CPC title

• H04L67/12

  specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks · CPC title

• H04L12/2803 Primary

  Home automation networks · CPC title