`5,948,061
`(114) Patent Number:
`United States Patent 55
`
`Merrimanetal.
`[45] Date of Patent:
`Sep. 7, 1999
`
`[54] METHOD OF DELIVERY, TARGETING, AND
`MEASURING ADVERTISING OVER
`NETWORKS
`
`WO 9721183
`
`6/1997 WIPO.
`
`OTHER PUBLICATIONS
`
`[75]
`
`Inventors: Dwight Allen Merriman; Kevin
`Joseph O’Connor, both of New York,
`N.Y.
`
`Booker, Ellis “Seeing a Gap, A Palo Alto Startup Will Debut
`Advertising Server for the Net”, Web Week,v.2 iss2. Avail-
`abe online at http:/Awww.interntworld.com, Feb. 1996.
`
`.
`:
`:
`[73] Assignee: Double Click, Inc., New York, N.Y.
`[21] Appl. No.: 08/738,634
`:
`°
`Filed:
`Oct, 29, 1996
`[22]
`[51]
`Int. Choeee GO06F 17/30; GOGF 151/00
`
`coececcccccccsssseteessces 709/219; 705/14; 707/501
`[52] US. Ch.
`[58] Field of Search oe. 395/200.36, 200.33,
`395/200.47, 200.48, 200.49; 705/26, 10,
`14, 27, 1; 707/10, 501, 513
`
`Metcalfe, Bob “From the Ether’, InfoWorld, v.18 iss 3.
`Available at http:/Avww.infoworld.com, Aug. 1996.
`NetGravity AdSerer 2.0 Annoucement. Available at http://
`www.netgravity.com, Oct. 1996.
`“Internet access: Internet marketing revolution begins in the
`USthis Sep.” (Hyper Net offering), EDGE: Work—Group
`Computing Report, v7 n316, Jun. 1996.
`KohdaY etal: Ubiquitous advertising on the WWW:Merg-
`ing Advertising on the Browser, Computer Networks and
`ISDN Systems, vol. 28, No. 11, May 1996, pp. 1493-1499.
`
`56
`[56]
`
`Cited
`Ref
`BNE
`SAPDEES
`U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS
`
`11/1997 Hogan wc cseecneseneee 705/27
`5,692,132
`
` 1/1998 Chelliah et alo wee 705/26
`5,710,887
`
`1/1998 Graber etal. ......
`. 395/200.47
`5,712,979
`2/1998 Graberetal. eee 395/200.57
`5,717,860
`
`2/1998 Logan etal. reece 395/200.47
`5,721,827
`
`3/1998 Gifford oeeesereteneneeee 380/24
`5,724,424
`3/1998 Herr-Hoymanetal.
`. 395/200.49
`5,727,156
`
`4/1998 FUdson svccsssssesssssccsssseesesecennseee 707/500
`5,737,619
`
`4/1998. Reilly et al
`705/14
`5,740,549
`
`5/1998 KifSCH seccccesecccccocecccccocece~395/200.33
`5.751.956
`
`5/1998 Rose et ale sevsesscsssssssssssssseeare 380/25
`5.757.917
`FOREIGN PATENT DOCUMENTS
`
`Primary Examiner—Dung C. Dinh
`Attorney, Agent, or Firm—Allan Jacobson
`
`[57]
`
`ABSTRACT
`
`Methods and apparatuses for targeting the delivery of adver-
`tisements over a network such as the Internet are disclosed.
`Statistics are compiled on individual users and networks and
`the use of the advertisements is tracked to permit targeting
`:
`eyes
`of the advertisements of individual users. In response to
`°
`:
`a
`.
`requests from affiliated sites, an advertising server transmits
`to people accessing the page of a site an appropriate one of
`the advertisement based upon profiling of users and net-
`works.
`
`50 Claims, 2 Drawing Sheets
`
`0 749 081
`
`12/1996 European Pat. Off.
`
`.
`
` ADVERTISI
`gf
`
`NG
`
`SERVER
`PROCESS
`
`te
`
`18
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0001
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0001
`
`
`
`U.S. Patent
`
`Sep. 7, 1999
`
`Sheet 1 of2
`
`5,948,061
`
`FIG.
`
`1
`
` ADVERTISING
`
`SERVER
`PROCESS
`
`FIG. 2
`
`DERIVE PROFILE
`PROCESS
`
`PROCESS
`
`AD SERVER
`PROCESSES
`
`MANAGEMENT
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0002
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0002
`
`
`
`U.S. Patent
`
`Sep. 7, 1999
`
`Sheet 2 of 2
`
`VE“9IF
`
`JE“IIs
`
`5,948,061
`
`
`NON33SSOVSova|NOO30119sov|Naassov|axs_[NozIva01]MozBALL|3dALNIvWOG|S34OQVaT|OLHN
`
`NO_N33SSOVS30¥d|$.NOG3X0T70HOTHd|“ONL39HVL|S.91S|O3MIIATylol|ivaONS|divaLaws|OTov|GEII4
`
` S3JAQId40“ON|3NOZWIL|NOTLVOO1
`
`
`OTHavH9O39|OTS|SS3HOOVYYOMLIN|SWVNNIVHOO
`
`
`
`
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0003
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0003
`
`
`
`
`
`5,948,061
`
`1
`
`METHOD OF DELIVERY, TARGETING, AND
`MEASURING ADVERTISING OVER
`NETWORKS
`
`2
`on web pagesovertime. It is a third object of the invention
`to provide the capability to gather information aboutrecipi-
`ents of the advertisement.
`
`BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
`
`SUMMARYOF THE INVENTION
`
`1. Area of the Art
`
`This invention relates to methods of delivery of adver-
`tisements and measuring responsesto those delivered adver-
`tisements and in particular relates to the targeting of adver-
`tisements delivered over networks such as the Internet.
`
`2. Description of the Prior Art
`In advertising, it is considered highly desirable to target
`advertisements to the appropriate potential customer base,
`rather than to broadcast advertisements in general. It has
`long been known that, for example, advertisements for
`computers should generally not appear in magazines on
`gardening and, conversely, advertisements for gardening
`tools should not appear
`in magazines on computers.
`Similarly, advertisers have generally targeted their adver-
`tisements on television to programs appropriate for the
`desired customer base.
`
`It has also long been knownthat an advertisementthatis
`repeated too often will eventually become ignored by con-
`sumers. Therefore, an advertiser typically wishes to elimi-
`nate duplication and reach as many individuals in the
`advertiser’s target group as possible.
`The recent development of on-line networks, such as
`America On-Line, Compuserve, and the Internet, has led to
`“on-line” advertising. For example, on the Internet, often
`such on-line advertisements will appear on a web page, such
`as a banner on the top or the bottom of the page. When the
`user views a web page using a browser such as Internet
`Explorer 3 or Netscape 3, the banner appears at the appro-
`priate location and the user may then try to find out more
`information regarding the advertisement by selecting the
`advertisement (clicking through on that banner) through the
`use of the mouse or other pointing device. This will cause a
`HTTP message to be generated by the browser using the
`information encapsulated in association with the banner to
`send a request for an object with a given URL address to a
`different appropriate web site to access, for example, the
`advertiser’s home page.
`Nonetheless, such advertising has had, so far, a poor rate
`of response because it
`is untargeted advertising. Thus,
`someone whois totally uninterested in computers other than
`they happen to be on the Internet, may continually see
`advertisements for computers. On the other hand, someone
`whois interested in computers may continually see adver-
`tisements for gardening tools when browsing through a
`particular web site. Thus it would be highly desirable to have
`a method of targeting the advertising to the appropriate user.
`In addition,
`if a user of such computer networks is
`continuously exposed to the same advertisement,
`the
`response rate to the advertisement will generally decline.
`Therefore,
`it
`is highly desirable to have a system that
`controls the frequency of exposure of advertisements to
`particular users. In addition,
`it is also important for the
`advertisers to track response to the advertisements and to
`acquire as much information about those people responding
`to the advertisements for targeting those same people atlater
`dates.
`
`These and other objects of the invention are achieved by
`the disclosed system and methods. Information about net-
`works and subnetworks is routinely collected. In addition,
`information about individual users is also gathered when
`users select (click on) different advertisements. Also, data is
`tracked on how often a given advertisement has been
`displayed, how often a given user has seen a given
`advertisement, and other information regarding the user and
`the frequency of the display of the advertisement.
`To effect such a capability, an advertising server process
`is provided as a node on the network. The various adver-
`tisements are stored on the network of the server and
`
`preferably on the server. When, for example, a user using a
`web browser accesses a web pagethat is affiliated with the
`advertising server process,
`the affiliated page’s encoding
`includes an embeddedreference to an object provided by the
`advertising server process. That causes the user’s browserto
`contact the advertising server process to provide the adver-
`tising image or information that will appear on the accessed
`web page as displayed by the user’s browser. Using the
`address information and/or other information passed by the
`browser for the user, including the page being accessed by
`the user, the advertising server process determines an appro-
`priate advertisement
`to select for the particular user. In
`addition, the advertising server process will use information
`such as the number of times the user has seen various
`advertisements, how often the advertisement has been seen
`by any user and the start and stop date for the various
`advertisements to select which advertisement to transmit to
`the user’s web page for display.
`If the user decides to respond to the advertisement
`selected by the web serverby clicking on the advertisement,
`the advertising server processlogsthat fact and to have more
`information about the given user. A derive profile processis
`used for compiling information on TCP/IP networks for use
`by the advertising server process. By compiling the infor-
`mation on networks and user selections,
`the advertising
`server process is able to compile information that can be
`used for targeting advertising.
`
`DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES
`
`FIG. 1 is diagram for explaining a first embodimentof the
`invention.
`
`FIG. 2 is a diagram explaining the processes performed in
`the preferred embodiments.
`FIGS. 3A, 3B and 3C are diagrams showing the basic
`structure of some of the databases kept by the advertising
`server.
`
`DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE
`INVENTION
`
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`The basic architecture of the network 10 comprises at
`least one affiliate web site 12, an advertisement (ad) server
`website 19 and one or more individual advertiser’s web sites
`
`Therefore, it is a first object of this invention to provide
`targeting of advertising over networks such as the Internet.
`It is a second object of this invention to provide control over
`frequency of exposure to users for advertisements appearing
`
`65
`
`18. Affiliates are one or moreentities that generally for a fee
`contract with the entity providing the advertisement server
`permit third party advertisements to be displayed on their
`websites. When a user using a browser accesses or “visits”
`a website of an affiliate, an advertisement provided by the
`advertisement server 19 will be superimposed on the display
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0004
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0004
`
`
`
`5,948,061
`
`3
`of the affiliate’s web page displayed by the user’s browser.
`Examples of appropriate affiliates include locator services,
`service providers, and entities that have popular websites
`such as museums, movie studios,etc.
`The basic operation of the system is as follows in the
`preferred embodiment. When a user browsing on the Inter-
`net accesses an affiliate’s web site 12, the user’s browser
`generates an HTTP message 20to get the informationfor the
`desired web page. The affiliate’s web site in response to the
`message 20 transmits one or more messages back 22 con-
`taining the information to be displayed by the user’s
`browser. In addition, an advertising server process 19 will
`provide additional
`information comprising one or more
`objects such as banner advertisements to be displayed with
`the information provided from the affiliate web site.
`Normally, the computers supporting the browser,the affiliate
`website and the advertising server process will beat entirely
`different nodes on the Internet. Upon clicking through or
`otherwise selecting the advertisement object, which may be
`an image such as an advertisement banner, an icon, or a
`video or an audioclip, the browser ends up being connected
`to the advertiser’s server or web site 18 for that advertise-
`ment object.
`In FIG. 1, a user operates a web browser, such as Netscape
`or Microsoft Internet Explorer, on a computer or PDA or
`other Internet capable device 16 to generate through the
`hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) 14 a request 20 to any
`one of preferably a plurality of affiliate web sites 12. The
`affiliate web site sends one or more messages back 22 using
`the same protocol. Those messages 22 preferably contain all
`of the information available at the particular web site 12 for
`the requested page to be displayed by the user’s browser 16
`except for one or more advertising objects such as banner
`advertisements. These objects preferably do not reside on
`the affiliate’s web server. Instead, the affiliate’s web server
`sends back a link including an IP address for a node running
`an advertiser server process 19 as well as information about
`the page on which the advertisementwill be displayed. The
`link by way of example may be a hypertext markup language
`(HTML) <img> tag, referring to, for example, an inline
`image such as a banner. The user’s browser 16 then transmits
`a message 23 using the received IP address to access such an
`object indicated by the HTMLtag from the advertisement
`server 19. Included in each message 23 typically to the
`advertising server 19 are: (i) the user’s IP address,(ii) a
`cookie if the browser 16 is cookie enabled and stores cookie
`information, (iii) a substring key indicating the page in
`which the advertisement to be provided from the serveris to
`be embedded, and (iv) MIME headerinformation indicating
`the browser type and version, the operating system of the
`computer on which the browser is operating and the proxy
`server type. Upon receiving the request in the message 23,
`the advertising server process 19 determines which adver-
`tisement or other object to provide to user’s browser and
`transmits the messages 24 containing the object such as a
`banner advertisement to the user’s browser 16 using the
`HTTPprotocol. Preferably contained within the HTTP mes-
`sage is a unique identifier for the advertiser’s web page
`appropriate for the advertisement. That advertisement object
`is then displayed on the image created by the web user’s
`browser as a composite of the received affiliate’s web page
`plus the object transmitted back by the advertising web
`server.
`
`As part of the “click through” process, when the user
`clicks on the banneror other advertising object displayed by
`the user’s browser 16, the user’s browser again transmits a
`message to the ad server. The ad server notes the address of
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`4
`the computer of the browser (or any other identifier such as
`a cookieora digital signature) that generated the message 23
`and transmits back the URLof the advertiser’s web page so
`that the user’s web browser 16 generates a message 26 to
`contact the advertiser’s web site. 18. The ad server process
`19 also notes that a “click through” for an advertisement has
`occurred and updates the various databases in the manner
`described below.In the above scenario for the click through
`process, the ad server process must remember which adver-
`tisement was sent to the user’s browser in order to know
`whereto redirect the user’s browser.
`
`While in the above embodiments, the user is a computer
`on an IP network using a browser, theaffiliate web sites are
`web pages of affiliates located somewhere on the Internet
`and the ad serveris a particular node on the Internet, other
`setups are also possible. The affiliates may be ISP’s or may
`be actual dedicated web servers and the users may be an
`entire network instead of an individual browsing on a single
`computer with a browser.
`FIG. 2 shows the ad server architecture. The ad server,
`which may comprise one or more servers uses a database 54
`that will be described below and performs reporting pro-
`cesses 59, management processes 58, derivation of profile
`processes 52 and advertisement processes 19. The derive
`profile process 52 is how the advertisement server gathers
`information about individual users or TCP/IP networks for
`individual users. Advertisements, which may be advertise-
`ment banners are stored within the ad server process 19 as
`part of the advertising server process 19 and are periodically
`updated and refreshed. The advertisement server process 19
`is used for responding to requests from advertisements
`provided by the user’s as described above. The management
`process 58 is used for updating the various advertisements
`and overall control of the advertising server process 19 and
`also permits the advertisers to interface with the database to
`obtain up to the date reports on the placement of the
`advertisements. The report process 59 is used for generating
`online reports about the success rate of the advertisement
`and statistics on the users that are viewing and clicking
`through on various advertisements and also updating the
`counters in the database that store how often an advertise-
`
`ment has been displayed.
`The basic database structure is shown in FIG. 3. For each
`user identified by the system as shown in FIG. 3A, a user
`identification, IP address, domain type, time zone, location
`of the user, standard industrial code for the user’s network,
`the particular advertisements seen and the numberof times
`each such advertisement is seen, the advertisements that
`were selected or “clicked on” and the pages on which the
`various users’ advertisements were seen is collected. By
`using the information such as which advertisements a user
`has expressed interest in and which pages the user was
`viewing when the user clicked through along with other
`information, targeted Internet advertising is possible.
`FIG. 3B shows a database structure for the advertise-
`ments. Included in the information for an advertisement are
`an identifier for the advertisement, the start date for the
`advertisement being carried, the last date the advertisement
`is to be carried, the total number of people who have viewed
`the advertisements, the target or the minimum number of
`times the advertisement is to be viewed, acceptable viewers
`by their web site’s SICS (Standard Industry Codes), clicked
`through and pages that the advertisements are seen on.
`Also, as noted above, to enhance the process of identify-
`ing information about varioususers, information on domains
`or networks is also tracked. This information includes the
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0005
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0005
`
`
`
`5,948,061
`
`5
`domain name and type (e.g., military, government,
`commerce, foreign countries), the IP address, the standard
`industrial code, the time zone and the address as shown in
`FIG. 3C. This information can be used in developing infor-
`mation about users. Throughthe use of these three databases
`and other appropriate databases that may be kept, the various
`processesof the advertising server process 19 are performed.
`
`Advertising Server Processes 19
`
`In response to an incoming message to the advertising
`server process 19, the advertising server processes 19 first
`attempts to identify the user in FIG. 2. This can be accom-
`plished by at least one of two means. First, any incoming
`request for an image or a multimedia object is examined to
`determined the IP address of the requesting browser. The
`advertising server then notes whether a cookie was received
`in the MIMEheading of the request. From these two pieces
`of information, a user identification is determined. If a
`cookie was detected, then the cookie contains the user’s
`identification number that can be accessed in the database.
`If the user’s browser is cookie enabled but no cookie is
`
`detected, then the request is from a new user so a user
`identification must be assigned to the user and that user’s
`new identification number will be transmitted back to the
`users browser along with a write cookie instruction that
`causes the browser to write a cookie containing that unique
`identification number on the user’s local drive for future
`accesses to affiliate sites. The cookie instruction is transmit-
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`object, which may be a banner image in a GIF or JPEGfile
`format, an icon for an audio or video clip or some other
`object is kept as part of the advertising server process. This
`information may include targeted consumers by SIC,
`country, organization type and type of advertisements pre-
`viously selected by the user. For any of the advertisements
`currently provided for which there is a match (for example
`there may be several advertisements targeted at people
`interested in computers), the next step is to determine which
`of the advertisements for which there is a match should be
`selected.
`
`The preferred embodiment also includes determining
`which advertising object should be selected if two or more
`advertising object have criteria matching the user. selecting
`from the matched advertisements by determining how often
`the particular user has been exposed to the given advertise-
`ment. For each user, data is kept about the numberof times
`that a user has seen a given advertisement based upon the
`user ID. For each advertisement where the user matches the
`criteria, if the number of times that the user has seen the
`advertisement is less than a predetermined threshold, the
`advertisementis retained as one of the possible matches. If
`the number of times that the user has seen a given adver-
`tisement exceeds the threshold,
`the advertisement is dis-
`carded as a possible candidate for transmitting back to the
`user.
`From the advertisements for which the user matches the
`criteria and for which the user has seen the advertisement
`
`less than the threshold, any of numberof algorithms may be
`used to select the particular advertisement to transmit back
`to the user. In an embodiment, the formula used is based
`upon a satisfaction index (SI) according to the following
`formula:
`
`ted back with the advertisement messages 24. Alternatively,
`instead of using cookies, digital signatures or certificates or
`log ins uniquely identifying the user accessing the affiliate
`page may beused.
`If the user’s browser does not support cookies, the adver-
`35
`end-—start
`n-
`tising server process looks up the user’s IP address in a table
`S[= — x» ————_
`that stores identification numbers that correspond to IP
`N now-start
`addresses for the users who have previously contacted the
`advertising server process. If the IP address is not found in
`the table, then the user is a new user and is assigned an
`unused identification number. Also, for each new user, that
`user’s identification number will be marked for further
`
`40
`
`processing under the derive profile process 52 described
`below. Also, if the domain for the new user has not previ-
`ously been processed in the domain profile process, it may
`not be possible to target the advertisement for the new user
`and rather the new user should be shown a generic adver-
`tisement. Also, for new users, a promotional advertisement
`may be shownto get the new user to provide information
`about him or herself and his or her employer.
`If the user is an existing user, the ad server 19 obtains
`from a databaseall of the information known aboutthe user
`
`including the user’s geographic location, the domain type
`(commercial educational, governmental, the Internet service
`provided), the organization type where the user works (for
`example a SIC code),
`the company size,
`the number of
`employees in that company, the particular types of adver-
`tisements that the user has clicked on by SIC or other
`appropriate coding and the numberoftimesthat the user has
`been exposed to each advertisement currently in the system
`as described in FIG. 3A.Also, the relative time of day for the
`user is calculated based uponeither the user’s country code
`or the user’s IP access provider or the location of their
`domain.
`
`Each advertisement along with a table of the targeting
`profile criteria for the advertisement and other data regard-
`ing the advertisement currently available is stored in a
`database such as shown in FIG. 3B. The actual advertising
`
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`Where:
`
`n: =the numberof times the particular advertisement has
`been viewed by anyone
`N: the numberof times the advertisementis to be see by
`anyone
`end-start: the total number of days that the advertisement
`is scheduled to run
`
`now-start: the numberof days that the advertisement has
`run to date
`The satisfaction index (SI) is 1.0 when the advertisementis
`on schedule. If the advertisement is running behind schedule
`(ie., the current rate of display meansthat the advertisement
`will not be viewed the targeted numberof times by the end
`date so that the SI is less than 1.0) while if the SI is greater
`than 1.0, the advertisement is running ahead of schedule.
`Therefore,
`the advertisement
`that
`is to be selected for
`viewing is the one that has a matched profile and has the
`smallest SI. Upon selecting the advertisement, the selected
`advertisement object
`is then transmitted to the user’s
`browser over the Internet by transmitting the GIF stored in
`RAM in one or more messages.
`After delivery of the advertisement to the user, additional
`processing needs to be done both for tracking the exposure
`of the advertisement and for having more information about
`the user. First, the system stores the fact that the advertise-
`ment wassent to the user by storing that information in the
`database based upon the user ID. This information is used
`for processing the user’s response to the advertisement when
`the user “clicks” on the advertisement. Also, the advertising
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0006
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0006
`
`
`
`5,948,061
`
`7
`processor updates the advertisements satisfaction index and
`logs the advertisement delivery for providing reports. Also,
`if the advertisement that has been sent has a limit on the
`number of times that the advertisement can be sent,
`the
`count of the numberof times that the advertisement has been
`transmitted is incremented. This limit can be the overall
`limit for the number of times that
`the advertisement is
`
`viewed and/or the limit that any specific user can view the
`advertisement. If the limit on the number of times the
`
`advertisement can be sent is reached, then the particular
`advertisement is removed from the list of those that can be
`transmitted. In addition, even if an advertisement has not
`been transmitted recently, the SI is updated to reflect the
`passage of time.
`If the user then decides that he wants to respond to the
`advertisement and then clicks on the advertisement,
`the
`advertisement server 19 receives an HTTP request 23 for a
`click through whichit will recognize by receiving the same
`IP address (and optionally,
`the user ID specified by the
`cookie, digital signature or certificate or
`log in
`identification) in the request from the same affiliate’s web
`page within a predetermined period. Since the advertisement
`server previously recorded which advertisement wassent to
`that IP address, it sends the redirect message causing the
`user’s browser to receive the URL for the advertiser’s web
`site based upon data stored in the server. In addition, the
`server logs that
`the advertisement was clicked through,
`which user selected the advertisement based upon the IP
`address, and the page on which the advertisement was seen
`based upon the click through. This information can then be
`logged in later reporting processes 59.
`As an alternative to using a satisfaction index, the selec-
`tion of the particular advertisement object to be sent back to
`the viewer’s browser by the advertising server process 19
`can be made bydifferent criteria. For example, models can
`be created to maximize the likelihood of a click through.
`Such models for maximizing the likelihood of a click
`through may be based upon empirically gathered informa-
`tion about either types of advertisements or
`individual
`advertisements actually on the system correlated to the
`compiled information on a useror the user’s network and the
`specific page through which the user is accessing the adver-
`tising server process 19.
`Derivative Profile Process 52
`
`In addition, as part of the profiling process for gathering
`information about users and IP addresses needs to be done.
`
`First, appropriate “networks” need to be identified based
`upon the TCP/IP network address of the user. Periodically,
`the derive profiles process searches the user database for the
`address of additional users that have addresses for unknown
`
`networks, indicating that they are new users. Then the server
`does a reverse domain name search to locate the domain
`name of the user. The server also queries Internet Whols
`databasesto find information about the network, which will
`often include the domain name.
`
`Alternatively, a reverse form of look up can be used
`independent of people accessing the network. When a
`domain is discovered, the server will check common DNS
`names for the name, such as those starting with “www”and
`“ftp”. These resolve to IP addresses in most cases. From the
`IP addresses, the network number can be extracted andif the
`network does not yet have a domain nameassociated with
`the network numberor address, the new domain associated
`with the network. A reverse domain name look up (A Whois
`lookup) will then usually provide the name, address and
`phone numberof the organization, thereby providing the
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`geographic location and the time zone of the network. Once
`the domain name is acquired,
`the server will determine
`whether the domain is an educational, military, governmen-
`tal network and for non-U.S. based networks what country
`the network is located in through the extension.
`However, it should be noted that some networks cover
`broad geographic areas and that further checking needsto be
`done to ensure that the data may be inaccurate. This can be
`done by performing a trace route operation to trace the
`network topology back to the network being examined. If
`the last two or three nodes on the trace show as being from
`a given region, the chancesare high that the specific user on
`a network is located in that geographic area. Thus, reverse
`traces can be used to confirm location with a database for
`geographic locations. By checking telephone directories and
`other sources, the specific location for such users may be
`found by looking up the locations where the owner of the
`domain namehasfacilities and using the one closest to the
`outcomeof the trace back step If the information for a given
`user is different than the location of the domain based upon
`the trace back,it is this address and location information that
`is then used.
`
`Further for each domain that is found, a determination
`must be made as to whether the domain is an Internet
`Service Provider (ISP). A list of domains that are ISP’s is
`compiled manually. For any user having a domain nameof
`an ISP, the user is presumedto be an individual and so only
`information relating to that
`individual are used for the
`profiling process.
`
`Reporting Process
`
`The reporting process uses standard database techniques
`for generating any desired reports. For example, reports
`showing the number of viewings and click throughs of
`various advertisements may be generated along with reports
`showing the click through rates relative to the matching
`criteria. Also, reports on the SI can be readily generated.
`In addition to using the domain profiling process and
`logging advertisementclicked on by individual users and the
`pages being accessed by users of affiliate web sites,
`in
`addition surveying may be used. Further, for those survey
`respondents whoare responding for non-ISP users discussed
`above,the results of the survey can beattributed to others on
`the same network. This provides further information for
`targeting the display of the advertisements.
`Of course, those of skill in the field will understand that
`the disclosed techniques need notjust be confined to Internet
`advertising but will work on other communication networks
`and private on line services such as CompuServe and
`America On Line.
`In addition, while specific user and
`domain profile information and matching criteria are
`discussed, it will be obviousto those of ordinary skill in the
`field that the specific type of user and domain name infor-
`mation profiled and used as matching criteria may include
`other or different criteria. In addition, while the specific
`examples are for IP networks, the same concepts can be
`applied to virtual LAN’s such that a VLAN is the equivalent
`of a domain or on IPX based protocols or other network
`protocols.
`Still further, rather than using cookies or IP addresses or
`other network addresses to identify the users, digital signa-
`tures or certificates may be used. In addition, a log in
`technique may be used whereby whenusersfirst access an
`affiliated web site,
`the user is assigned through a log in
`procedure a unique identifier and a log in name. When the
`user subsequently accesses either the same or a different
`
`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0007
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`Petitioner Hyundai Ex-1022, 0007
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`5,948,061
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`9
`logs in using the unique
`the user
`affiliated web site,
`identifier,
`thereby ensuring that users can be identified
`notwithstanding proxy servers or different users using the
`same computer.
`Still further, those of ordinary skill in the field will also
`understand that while the advertising server,the affiliate web
`site and t