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US 11,232,404 B2Granted
Linkage of relationship and transaction data
AssigneeHealthVerity, Inc.
InventorAndrew Kress
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A system and method for providing an individual with information on the transaction of other members of that individual's social network while preserving individual anonymity. The method including de-identifying or encrypting individually identifiable relationship data, de-identifying or encrypting individually identifiable transaction data, and linking the de-identified relationship data and the de-identified transaction data. The disclosed system uses the same hash function or encryption algorithm to de-identify or encrypt both the relationship data and the transaction data, enabling the system to identify and link records associated with the same user in both data sets by making a deterministic or probabilistic determination.
Claims20
A method, comprising:
- receiving individually identifiable relationship data associated with a first user and a second user, the individually identifiable relationship data associated with the second user including a link or association with the first user;
- receiving individually identifiable transaction data associated with the first user;
- de-identifying or encrypting the individually identifiable relationship data associated with the first user to form de-identified relationship data associated with the first user by using a hash function or encryption algorithm to generate a first key and replacing data identifying the first user with the first key;
- de-identifying or encrypting the individually identifiable transaction data associated with the first user to form de-identified transaction data associated with the first user by using the hash function or encryption algorithm to generate a second key and replacing data identifying the first user with the second key;
- identifying de-identified relationship data associated with the first user and de-identified transaction data associated with the first user by making a determination that the first key is identical or similar to the second key;
- linking the de-identified relationship data associated with the first user and the de-identified transaction data associated with the first user;
- de-identifying or encrypting the individually identifiable relationship data associated with the second user to form de-identified relationship data associated with the second user;
- and
- outputting the de-identified transaction data associated with the first user to the second user in response to a determination that the de-identified relationship data associated with the second user includes a link or association with the first user.
6 more elements
A system, comprising:
- a relationship database for storing:
- individually identifiable relationship data associated with a first user;
- and
- individually identifiable relationship data associated with a second user that includes a link or association with the first user;
- a transaction database for storing individually identifiable transaction data associated with the first user;
- and
- a processor configured to:
- de-identify or encrypt the individually identifiable relationship data associated with the first user to form de-identified relationship data associated with the first user by using a hash function or encryption algorithm to generate a first key and replacing the data identifying the first user with the first key;
- de-identify or encrypt the individually identifiable transaction data associated with the first user to form de-identified transaction data associated with the first user by using the hash function or encryption algorithm to generate a second key and replacing the data identifying the first user with the second key;
- identify de-identified relationship data associated with the first user and de-identified transaction data associated with the first user by making a determination that the first key is identical or similar to the second key;
- link the de-identified social network data associated with the first user and the de-identified transaction data associated with the first user;
- de-identifying or encrypting the individually identifiable relationship data associated with the second user to form de-identified relationship data associated with the second user;
- and
- output the de-identified transaction data associated with the first user to the second user in response to a determination that de-identified relationship data associated with the second user includes a link or association with the first user.
11 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.