Methods and apparatus for nonintrusive monitoring of web browser usage
AssigneeThe Nielsen Company (US), LLC
InventorMorris Lee
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An example system disclosed herein comprises a web browser monitor to extract textual information from a captured image comprising at least a portion of content displayed by a web browser implemented by a monitored device, and determine color scheme information for a region of the captured image comprising at least a portion of the content displayed by the web browser. The example system also comprises a central processing facility to process the extracted textual information received from the web browser monitor, and compare the color scheme information received from the web browser monitor to reference color schemes associated with reference web pages to determine web sites accessed using the web browser.
Claims18
A system to monitor Internet usage, the system comprising:
- a web browser monitor to:
- extract textual information from a captured image representative of a web page displayed by a web browser implemented by a monitored device;
- and
- determine color scheme information for a region of the captured image comprising at least a portion of the web page displayed by the web browser, the color scheme information for the region of the captured image being represented by a histogram corresponding to respective numbers of pixels in the region having respective different colors displayed in the region;
- and
- a computer processor to compare the color scheme information to reference color schemes associated with respective reference web pages to identify, based on the color scheme information, a web site accessed using the web browser.
A method to monitor web browsing, the method comprising:
- extracting textual information from a captured image representative of a web page displayed by a web browser implemented by a monitored device;
- determining color scheme information for a region of the captured image comprising at least a portion of the web page displayed by the web browser, the color scheme information for the region of the captured image including a histogram representing respective numbers of pixels in the region having respective different colors displayed in the region;
- and
- comparing, with a processor, the color scheme information to reference color schemes associated with respective reference web pages to identify, based on the color scheme information, a web site accessed using the web browser.
A tangible machine readable storage device or storage disk comprising machine readable instructions which, when executed, cause a machine to at least:
- extract textual information from a captured image representative of a web page displayed by a web browser implemented by a monitored device;
- determine color scheme information for a region of the captured image comprising at least a portion of the web page displayed by the web browser, the color scheme information for the region of the captured image being formatted as a histogram representing respective numbers of pixels in the region having respective different colors displayed in the region;
- and
- compare the color scheme information to reference color schemes associated with respective reference web pages to identify, based on the color scheme information, a web site accessed using the web browser.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.