System and method for providing call gating using a femto cell

A femto cell located at a customer premises for providing cellular call gating, the femto cell comprising:

• a transceiver configured to send and receive signals between the femto cell and one or more cellular devices within range of the femto cell;
• an Ethernet port to provide a connection between the femto cell located at the customer premises and an Internet Protocol (“IP”) network to provide connectivity, through a broadband router at the customer premises, to a mobile switching center (MSC) associated with a mobile service provider providing cellular service to the cellular device;
• and
• a processing unit configured to execute instructions to perform operations comprising:
• enabling a call gating function of the femto cell located at the customer premises associated with a cellular device in response to receiving an activation signal from the cellular device;
• providing a web interface for a user to provide a list of allowed telephone numbers and a list of blocked telephone numbers, the interface accepting wildcard characters to allow the user to block or accept multiple telephone numbers with a single entry in one of the lists;
• monitoring for an incoming call to the cellular device in response to enabling the call gating function associated with the cellular device;
• identifying a caller ID associated with an incoming call in response to receiving an incoming call to the cellular device;
• determining whether the caller ID is on a list of allowed caller IDs associated with the cellular device;
• and
• routing the incoming call to the cellular device in response to a determination that the caller ID is on the list of allowed caller IDs associated with the cellular device,
• wherein the call gating function includes timing features for gradually reducing a number of allowed incoming calls based on time of day.