Methods of and apparatus for providing telephone call control and information

A telephone call management system comprising:

• a computer network facility including a web server for communications with web browsers of telephone subscribers, an information database for storing telephone number information relating to the subscribers, and a telephone call control system;
• a telephone switch including a switch-computer interface;
• and
• a communications path between the telephone call control system of the computer network facility and the switch-computer interface of the telephone switch;
• wherein information relating to telephone communications to and/or from telephone numbers of subscribers is communicated via the communications path from the telephone switch to the computer network facility and is stored in the database for the respective subscribers, and information for controlling telephone communications is communicated via the communications path from the computer network facility to the telephone switch in response to remote access by the respective subscribers to the information database via web browsers of the respective subscribers and the web server of the computer network facility.

A method of telephone call management, comprising the steps of:

• storing personal telephone directories and call logs of telephone subscribers for remote access by the subscribers via a web facility;
• supplying information, relating to at least some telephone communications associated with the telephone subscribers, from a telephone switch to the web facility;
• updating the personal telephone directories and call logs of the telephone subscribers in dependence upon information supplied by the subscribers by the remote access via the web facility and the information supplied from the telephone switch;
• and
• supplying information from the web facility to the telephone switch, for controlling telephone communications for the subscribers via the telephone switch, in response to the remote access by the subscribers via the web facility.