System and method for identifying an unidentified person using an ambiguity-resolution criterion

A system for automatically and unambiguously identifying a currently unidentified caller as a particular known person, comprising:

• a database containing a stored digital representation of speech and a stored ambiguity-resolution criterion identified with a known person, the digital representation of speech for the known person being independent of an account code for the known person, the ambiguity-resolution criterion for the known person being stored in a previous session and being independent of the digital representation of speech for the known person;
• and
• a processing system coupled to the database and operable to receive, in a current session and prior to identification of the currently unidentified caller, a digital representation of speech for the caller and an ambiguity-resolution identifier for the caller, the digital representation of speech for the caller being independent of an account code for the caller, the ambiguity-resolution identifier for the caller being independent of the digital representation of speech for the caller, the processing system further operable to perform a first automatic comparison of the digital representation of speech for the still currently unidentified caller with the stored digital representation of speech for the known person to identify the caller as the particular known person, the processing system further operable to perform a second automatic comparison of the ambiguity-resolution identifier for the caller received in the current session prior to identification of the caller with the ambiguity-resolution criterion for the known person stored in the previous session to verify the identification of the caller as the particular known person made as a result of the first automatic comparison, the second automatic comparison being performed independent of human interaction between the first and second automatic comparisons.

A method for automatically and unambiguously identifying a currently unidentified caller as a particular known person, comprising:

• storing, in previous sessions, both digital representations of speech and ambiguity-resolution criteria identified with a plurality of known persons, the digital representations of speech for the known persons being independent of account codes for the known persons, the ambiguity-resolution criteria for the known persons being independent of the digital representations of speech for the known persons;
• receiving, in a current session prior to identification of the currently unidentified person, both a digital representation of speech for the caller and an ambiguity-resolution identifier for the caller, the digital representation of speech for the caller being independent of an account code for the caller, the ambiguity-resolution identifier for the caller being independent of the digital representation of speech for the caller;
• performing a first automatic comparison of the digital representation of speech for the still currently unidentified caller with at least some of the stored digital representations of speech for the known persons;
• identifying the caller as at least one of the known persons;
• and
• if the caller is ambiguously identified as more than one of the known persons as a result of the first automatic comparison, performing a second automatic comparison of the ambiguity-resolution identifier for the caller received in the current session prior to identification of the caller with at least one ambiguity-resolution criterion for a known person stored in a previous session to unambiguously identify the caller as a particular one of the known persons, the second automatic comparison being performed independent of human interaction between the first and second automatic comparisons.