Web access control
OwnerYigang Cai, Shiyan Huainventors
Life of this patent
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Abstract
This invention relates to a method and apparatus for controlling user access to websites. A user profile is stored for each user. The profile includes a restriction requirement. Each accessible website has an associated restriction rating. If a user tries to access a website, the restriction requirement of the user is compared with the restriction rating of the website; access is only allowed if the result of the comparison indicates that access is allowable. Advantageously, this arrangement permits users to define the restriction requirement to be met by the restriction rating of websites to which the user is allowed access.
Claims12
A method of filtering requests to access a website from a customer terminal comprising the steps of:
- storing a customer profile for a user of said customer terminal, said customer profile comprising customer restriction requirements;
- storing restriction rating data for each Uniform Resource Locator (URL) of said website;
- responsive to a request received from said customer station for accessing said website, comparing said restriction requirement for said customer terminal with said restriction rating data for said website to determine whether the allowed requests from said customer station based on said customer restriction requirement permit access to said URL of said website based on restriction rating data for said website;
- and
- responding to requests to access said website only if said customer restriction requirement data and said website restriction rating data taken together permit such access.
Apparatus for filtering requests to access a website from a customer terminal comprising:
- means for storing a customer profile for a user of said customer terminal, said customer profile comprising customer restriction requirements;
- means for storing restriction rating data for each Uniform Resource Locator (URL) of said website;
- means, responsive to a request received from said customer station for accessing said website, for comparing said restriction requirement for said customer terminal with said restriction rating data for said website to determine whether the allowed requests from said customer station based on said customer restriction requirement permit access to said URL of said website based on restriction rating data for said website;
- and
- means for responding to requests to access said website only if said customer restriction requirement data and said website restriction rating data taken together permit such access.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.