Electronic mailing system
OwnerEiji Kawaguchi, Richard Easoninventors
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An electronic mail system and method in which a message receiver creates an envelope containing envelope media data that is hidden with an embedding-and-extracting key. The message sender acquires the message receiver's envelope and, using an embedding-and-extracting key, embeds a secret message in the acquired envelope media data. The embedded envelope is sent to the message receiver, who extracts the secret message from the received embedded envelope using the same embedding-and-extracting key used to embed the data. As a result a secret message can be sent from the sender to the receiver without being eavesdropped on during the communication.
Claims18
An electronic mailing system comprising:
- an envelope creation means for creating an envelope comprising envelope media data and an embedding-and-extracting key hidden within said envelope media data;
- an embedding means for embedding a secret message into said envelope media data using said embedding-and-extracting key and for removing said embedding-and-extracting key from an embedded envelope;
- an extracting means for extracting said secret message from said embedded envelope using said embedding-and-extracting key.
An electronic mailing system wherein each member of an organization is linked with each other over an electronic network system comprising:
- an envelope creation means for allowing each member to create an envelope, said envelope comprising envelope media data and a hidden embedding-and-extracting key;
- a storage means for each member to store said envelope on an electronic network system;
- an acquisition means for each member to acquire envelopes created by other members through the electronic network system;
- an embedding means for discovering said embedding-and-extracting key that is hidden within said envelope media data, embedding a secret message in said envelope media data using the embedding-and-extracting key, and for removing said embedding-and-extracting key from said envelope media data to create an embedded envelope;
- a sending means for sending said embedded envelope through the electronic mailing system;
- a receiving means for receiving said embedded envelope through the electronic mailing system;
- and
- an extracting means for extracting said secret message out of said embedded envelope.
An electronic communication method to allow an envelope creator to receive a secret message from a message sender, said method comprising the steps of:
- creating an envelope comprising envelope media data and an embedding-and-extracting key hidden within said envelope media data;
- allowing the message sender to acquire said envelope;
- embedding a secret message into said envelope media data of said envelope using said embedding-and-extracting key;
- removing said embedding-and-extracting key from said envelope to form an embedded envelope;
- sending said embedded envelope to said envelope creator;
- and
- extracting said secret message from said embedded envelope using said embedding-and-extracting key.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.