GB2425678A

GB2425678A - E-mail account with corresponding telephone number

Info

Publication number: GB2425678A
Application number: GB0508423A
Authority: GB
Inventors: David Landsberg
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 2005-04-26
Filing date: 2005-04-26
Publication date: 2006-11-01
Also published as: GB0508423D0

Abstract

The invention relates to a method of operating an email system in which a request for an email account is received from a user, the request including a telephone number. The system determines whether an email account already exists corresponding to the telephone number and, if it does not, then sets up the user account having an email address corresponding to the telephone number. If the request does not originate from the telephone number, the system requests verification from the telephone number.

Description

METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR REDUCING

UNSOLICiTED ELECTRONIC MAIL TRAFFIC

Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to a method and system for reducing unsolicited email traffic, otherwise known as spam

Background to the Invention

Spam email is unsolicited junk email sent to large groups of email addresses, usually for the purposes of advertising The lists of email addresses are often harvested from Usenet postings or web-pages, obtained from databases, or simply guessed by using common names and domains Similarly to methods used for distributing traditional junk mail, there are companies which specialise in creating email distribution lists, often from addresses obtained when users legitimately sign up for mailing lists.

The individuals responsible for sending spam (spammers) avoid attempts by users to simply block emails coming from certain addresses or domains, by constantly setting up new user accounts from which to send spam and using fake email addresses from which the spam appears to originate Numerous software products are available for protecting users' inboxes from incoming spam. The simplest spam filters can merely look for key words in the subject line of emails, or emails which have been sent to large groups of addresses More complex programmes use Bayesian algorithms to identify spam However, spammers continually find new ways of sending spam to circumvent even the most complex of spain filters, and even the most sophisticated automated algorithms can misidentify legitimate emails as spam and vice versa Spam is a considerable nuisance to email users as it takes time to download and takes up valuable storage space in email inboxes There is therefore a need for a system which can reliably reduce unsolicited email traffic, both by the restricting of sending spam and the reduction of incoming spam into users mailboxes.

Summary of the Invention

The present invention provides a method of operating an email system 1 5 comprising the steps of: receiving a request for an email account from a user, the request including a telephone number, determining whether an email account already exists corresponding to the telephone number and, if it does not, then setting up the user account having an email address corresponding to the telephone number; and if the request does not originate from the telephone number, requesting verification from the telephone number The present invention also provides an email system comprising means for receiving a request for an email account from a user, the request including a telephone number, means for determining whether an email account already exists corresponding to the telephone number and, if it does not, then setting up the user account having an email address corresponding to the telephone number, and means determining whether the request originates from the telephone number and, if it is not, requesting verification from the telephone number Therefore, in the present invention, a user has an email address which corresponds to a telephone number, and if the request for the email account was not received from the telephone numbei the system requests verification from the telephone number The system determines whether an email address already exists corresponding to the telephone number so that only a single email account can be set up for each telephone number. This therefore prevents spammers from easily setting up multiple email addresses for sending sparn, unless they additionally have multiple telephone numbers Furthermore, the method verifies that the telephone number exists, either because the request is received from that number or because verification is required from that number. This assists in preventing spammers from readily setting up multiple email addresses, as the telephone numbers used must be active Preferably, the system contacts the telephone number to confirm that the account is active In one embodiment, the request for an email account is entered via a website, in which case the telephone number is entered by the user The user is then requested to confirm the request by SMS from the telephone number Alternatively, the request may be received via SMS, in which case the telephone number is the telephone number from which the SMS is sent.

Preferably, the usage level of the user account is monitored and, when usage exceeds a predetermined level, the user account is re-verified by contacting the telephone number and determining whether a response is received The usage level may be monitored by counting the number of outgoing emails or the total size of outgoing data Accounts with high usage therefore require regular re-verification to thereby further deter their use by spammers.

Preferably, at predetermined intervals of time, the user account is reverified by contacting the telephone number and determining whether a response is received Thus all accounts require regular re-verification, regardless of their usage levels Preferably, the telephone number is the number of a GSM mobile device, and preferably the or each step of contacting the telephone number comprises sending an SMS message Preferably the or each step of determining whether a response is received comprises determining whether an SMS message is received.

Preferably, the email address includes the telephone number i.e the string of numbers makes up a part of the alpha-numeric string forming the email address. This means that the user has a readily memorable email address which corresponds to their telephone number Preferably, on each step of verification or re-verification, a predetermined number of credits is allocated to the user's account Preferably, on receipt of an email from a sender's email address, the system determines whether the sender's email address is on a whitelist of allowed addresses, and, if the sender's email address is on the whitelist, the system allows receipt or forwarding of the email The user can maintain his own whitelist by adding or removing addresses as he pleases, but the system may automatically add addresses to the whitelist, for instance when an outgoing email is sent to an address which is not already on the whitelist This ensures that any response to that sent email can be received The use of a whitelist of allowed email addresses allows for the filtering of spam emails, or emails from unknown sources Preferably, on receipt of an email from a sender's email address, the system determines whether the sender's email address is on a whitelist of allowed addresses; and, if the sender's email address is not on the whitelist, the system determines whether the sender's email address is an email address belonging to the system, and if the email address is an email address belonging to the system, allows receipt or forwarding of the email and deducts a credit from the sender's user account. Thus, the system allows subscribers to send email addresses to emails for which the sender is not on the recipient's whitelist, but each time such an email is sent, a credit is deducted from the sender's account This thereby limits the number of such messages which can be sent from an account and therefore makes the accounts unattractive to spammers To gain more credits, a user must complete a re- verification step.

Preferably, if the sender has insufficient credit, the system sends a message to the sender requesting the sender to re-verify his account This is achieved by contacting the telephone number associated with the account and determining whether a response is received and, if a response is received, allocating a predetermined number of credits to the sender's account Preferably, on receipt of an email from a sender's email address, the system determines whether the sender's email address is on a whitelist of allowed email addresses; and, if the sender's email address is not on the whitelist, the system determines whether the sender's email address is an email address belonging to the system, and if the email address is not an email address belonging to the system, the system stores the email in a temporary file and sends an email to the sender requesting them to become a member of the system.

Preferably, on receipt of an email from a sender's email address, the system determines whether the sender's email address is on a blacklist of denied addresses; and, if the sender's email address is on the recipient's blacklist, the system bounces the email back to the sender. This allows the user to block email from specific sources

Brief Description of the Drawing

Preferred embodiments of the present invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawing, in which: Figure 1 is a straight configuration of a system in accordance with the present invention

Detailed Description

Figure 1 illustrates a system architecture for a system in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention. This embodiment of the invention utilises known open source components which have been successfully used for large scale applications in the Internet world The services are deployed on an array of machines running Unix, and the services are partitioned across the various machines to allow efficient utilisation of computing and network resources and enabled redundancy of the service.

A scripted object orientated web application framework 3 such as Ruby on Rails allows user interaction with the system of the present invention via a web browser 10. An SMTP mail transfer agent I such as Postfix handles outgoing and incoming mail Incoming mail can be screened by various types of known spam filtering software and virus checking software In this case, a high performance multi-threaded daemon Amavisd- new 9 calls SpamAssassin 5 and CIamAV 6 routines for incoming messages. The SpamAssassin program 5 carries out automated whitelist/blacklist and Bayesian rule-based scanning of spam, and ClaniAV 6 carries out cleaning/deletion of incoming viruses A Cyrus mailstore 2 provides access to mail from either a web application or mail clients such as Outlook, and a PostgreSQL database 4 provides storage of user account information and preferences. A sieve application 7 provides user controlled handling of incoming mails, e.g. filing to folders or vacation auto reply SMS handler 11 handles incoming SMS messages Custom Mail Daemons 12 process incoming mail in accordance with customised rules as described below in accordance with a method of the present invention.

There are generally two alternative ways that a user may register with the system to set up a user account. The user may register via the Internet, in which case the user logs onto a website and selects to register. The user enters a mobile telephone number and a desired password. The system checks whether an account already exists for that telephone number and, if not, an account is set up and the user is asked to confirm their request by sending an SMS message with a code to verify that they wish to proceed and are in possession of the phone. The system verifies that the received message corresponds to the requested account, and sends back an SMS to the user confirming their account registration and activation This comprises the verification of the account.

In an alternative method of setting up a user account, a user may see an advertisement for the system, the advertisement including a code to send by SMS to a specified number The user sends the code in an SMS message which, when received by the system, is checked to see that the number from which the SMS has been received is not already registered on the system If the number is not already registered, an account is set up and an SMS is returned to the user's telephone number with a password for logging on to the user account A further method of registering with the system will be described later.

When an account is set up, the user is allocated a predetermined number of credits Furthermore, the user can set up a whitelist of allowed addresses and a blacklist of denied addresses. The user may also set up aliases for their email account corresponding to other telephone numbers they may own, and also a more human-friendly name When sending emails to recipients who are not on the user's whitelist, the recipients addresses are automatically added to the whitelist. If emails are sent via SMTP, SMTP authorisation is performed and then the email is sent. Outgoing emails are appended with custom messages to allow for viral marketing of the service.

incoming emails are screened for obvious spam using SpamAssassin's Bayesian scanning and network tests The basic spam engine is trained by the system administrators to recognise obvious spam messages, so no user input is required incoming emails are also screened for viruses, cleaned if possible or else deleted.

The originator of the email is notified of failed delivery if appropriate.

The rules governing how the system deals with incoming emails are summarised in the table below To Condition Action LAnY user subscriber Sender in whitelist Store or forward the mail Non subscriber subscriber S e ii d e r n o t in Store mail in temporary storage L whitelist and bounce back mail to sender I requesting them to sign up to _____________________ system subscriber subscriber Sender not in Deduct email unit from sender's whitelist account. If insufficient credit, _____________________ prompt sender to reverify.

Any user subscriber Sender in blacklist Bounce mail Systeml admms/ subscriber Any Store or forward the mail marketeers Incoming emails from any user in the user's whitelist are delivered to the user and stored in the user's inbox or forwarded according to the user's stored preferences The received emails can also be automatically filed into particular mail folders by the user if desired using sieve scripts. If the sender's email address is not in the user's whitelist, if the user is also a subscriber to the system of the present invention, then the mail is successfully delivered and a credit unit is deducted from the sender's account If the sender has insufficient credit, the email is queued and the sender is sent a message by SMS to the telephone number associated with the sender's account prompting the sender to reverify the account by sending an SMS When the sender has reverified, the email can be delivered and a credit deducted from the sender's account. If the sender is not subscribed to the system of the present invention, then a message is sent by email by the sender requesting them to sign up to the system of the present invention.

If the sender's email address is in the user's blacklist, then the email will be bounced back to the sender Any emails from administrators or marketers of the system will be allowed to be stored or forwarded If the intended recipient's account is not currently active, either due to incomplete registration or lack of reverification, incoming emails are held in a holding holder for the user Once the recipient reverifies/completes registration, their pending emails are released into their general inbox A further method by which a user may register for a user account in the system of the present invention is after receiving a bounced message sent to an existing user The bounced message contains a URL specifying the temporary storage location of the original message and taking them to a modified enrollment usecase. The user enters a telephone number and password and, if no account already exists corresponding to that telephone number, a new account is set up and the user is requested to text a four digit code to a specified number. Once the text is received, the account is activated and a confirmation SMS is sent. The previously stored email is sent to the intended recipient as an attachment to an email from the new user account All user accounts are sent an SMS message whenever their email usage exceeds a predetermined level and the user must send an SMS message in response All user accounts are also verified by SMS at regular periodic intervals to ensure accounts are active Verification entitles users to a predetermined number of credits which are used to determine whether the user is a genuine customer or a potential spammer Users of the service are able to manage the following features via the Internet interface to the system, in addition to the basic features of email reading and composing.

Feature Description Details 1

Ui Account Change password Also allows user to I management replace forgotten password or unlock their accountvia 1. Security question validation, 2.

___________________ ________________________ SMS

Ui. View Email logs Show summary of emails

2 senllreceived per billing _______________________ period

UI View SMS verifications Show summary of SMSs

3 and Email units remaining sent to reveri' account ________________________ (aid top up email units).

Ui. Setup alias accounts Set up alias accounts for 5 numeric aliases (other 4 primary email (mobile numbers eg, landline) 1 ___________________ number). alphanumeric alias UI Address book Import CSV delimited file Will also allow management to whitelist importlexport of VCF ____________________________ files UI Export address book in 6 ______________ CSV UI. Whitelist/blacklist Assign address book 7 management contacts to whitelist or ____________________________ blacklist Ui Mail aggregation Allow user to poll Will be extended to other 8 POP3/IMAP mail at other systems such as Hotmail - ___________________ accounts. and Yahoo Ui. Sieve scripting Allow for user to set up Mail forwarding/auto 9 mail forwarding and responding can be ___________________ vacation autoresponder prformed on each alias I I separately.

As an alternative to the verification and reverification by SMS, Interactive Voice Response (IVR) may be used, whereby the user calls a number and follows a series of voice prompts to complete reverification

Claims

1 A method of operating an email system comprising the steps of receiving a request for an email account from a user, the request including a telephone number, determining whether an email account already exists corresponding to the telephone number and, if it does not, then setting up the user account having an email address corresponding to the telephone number, and if the request does not originate from the telephone number, requesting verification from the telephone number

2. A method according to claim 1, wherein the request is entered via a website

3 A method according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the request is received via SMS.

4. A method according to claim 1, 2 or 3, further comprising the step of contacting the telephone number to confirm that the email account is active

5 A method according to any one of the preceding claims, further comprising the step of monitoring the usage level of the user account and, when usage exceeds a predetermined level, verifying the user account by contacting the telephone number and determining whether a response is received.

6. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, further comprising the step of, at predetermined intervals of time, verifying the user account by contacting the telephone number and determining whether a response is received.

7 A method according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein the telephone number is the number of a GSM mobile device.

8 A method according to claim 7, wherein the or each step of contacting the telephone number comprises sending an SMS message.

9 A method according to claim 6 or 8, wherein the or each step of receiving a response comprises receiving an SMS message A method according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein the email address includes the telephone number 11. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, including the step of, on verification, allocating a predetermined number of credits to the user's account.

12 A method according to any one of the preceding claims, including the step of, on receipt of an email from a sender's email address, determining whether the sender's email address is on a whitelist of allowed addresses, and, if the sender's email address is on the whitelist, allowing receipt or forwarding of the email 13 A method according to any one of the preceding claims, including the step of, on receipt of an email from a sender's email address, determining whether the sender's email address is on a whitelist of allowed addresses; and, if the sender's email address is not on the whitelist, determining whether the sender's email address is an email address belonging to the system, and if the email address is an email address belonging to the system, allowing receipt or forwarding of the email and deducting a credit from the sender's user account 14 A method according to any one of the preceding claims, comprising the step of, if the sender has insufficient credit, sending a message to the sender requesting the sender to verify his account by contacting the telephone number associated with the account and determining whether a response is received and, on verification, allocating a predetermined number of credits to the sender's account 15. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, including the step of, on receipt of an email from a sender's email address, determining whether the sender's email address is on a whitelist of allowed addresses, and, if the sender's email address is not on the whitelist, determining whether the sender's email address is an email address belonging to the system, and if the email address is not an email address belonging to the system, storing the email in a temporaiy file and sending an email to the sender requesting them to become a member of the system 16 A method according to any one of the preceding claims, including the step of, on receipt of an email from a sender's email address, determining whether the sender's email address is on a blacklist of denied addresses, and, if the sender's email address is on the blacklist, returning the email to the sender 17 An email system comprising means for receiving a request for an email account from a user, the request including a telephone number, means for determining whether an email account already exists corresponding to the telephone number and, if it does not, then setting up the user account having an email address colTesponding to the telephone number, and means for determining whether the request originates from the telephone number and, if it is not, requesting verification from the telephone number.