US 2011/0218916 A1 · Secure, Closed-Loop Electronic Transfer of Money

Abstract

A method of providing for a money transfer over a network includes the steps of: providing a stamp having a face value and a lifespan both indicated on the stamp, the stamp being a string that is a concatenation of two or more fields including the face value and the lifespan, with at least one of the fields calculated according to a prescription involving a hashing or encryption of a concatenation of others of the fields or of some other field not part of the stamp; affixing the stamp to an e-mail; and allowing the recipient of the e-mail to obtain value for the stamp if the stamp is presented to a predetermined entity (such as a stamp issuer) for the stamp value within the lifespan indicated on the stamp. The stamp may comprise a concatenation of a set of fields, including a lifespan, a stamp value; and hash/encryption.

Claims39

Dependent claims

A computer-implemented method for transferring money electronically, the method comprising:

accessing an account associated with a sender;
receiving a request for a stamp from the sender;
generating a stamp, the stamp comprising a face value field, a lifespan field, and a field comprising a hash or encryption of information other than the face value field and the lifespan field, wherein the stamp is electronically transmittable from the sender to a recipient;
sending the stamp to the sender for transmission to a recipient;
receiving from the recipient a request to redeem the stamp;
accessing an account associated with the recipient;
determining whether the stamp is expired based on the lifespan field of the stamp;
and
if the stamp is not expired, transferring value associated with the stamp to the account of the recipient.

6 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Secure, Closed-Loop Electronic Transfer of Money

Life of this patent

Secure, Closed-Loop Electronic Transfer of Money

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims39