Collection of enhanced caller ID information

Abstract

Network entities such as an access device and a gateway analyze messages exchanged during a communication session to identify information items of interest such as, for example, email addresses, universal resource locators, file paths, and attachments. References to and/or the contents of the identified information items may be stored in a database that associates the identified information items with the participants of the communication session. The participants in the communication session may be identified by conventional caller ID information, or by an Internet protocol address, an electronic serial number, or a variety of other identifiers. Information received at the beginning of a later communication session that identifies participant(s) in that communication session may then be used to select from the database, information items from previous communication session, that are associated with the identified participant in the current communication session. Information about the selected information items may be delivered as enhanced caller ID information to parties of the communication session, allowing them to have easy access to the previously exchanged information.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.