Relationship Strength Scoring for Wireless Network Access Control
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Crowd sourced wireless networks face security concerns due to automatic access sharing without manual password input, potentially allowing malicious activity by acquaintances or strangers with social media connections.
Innovation Solution
A method and system that use relationship strength scores to determine if a user's social media connections meet set criteria for automatic access to a wireless network, calculating scores based on additional information and caching them for evaluation, allowing only connections with a relationship strength above a set threshold to access the network.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If automatic access sharing is implemented based on social media connections, then ease of operation is improved, but security deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a relationship strength threshold parameter to filter and evaluate social connections. Instead of treating all social media connections equally, the system assigns different weights or scores to connections based on their strength (e.g., frequent interaction vs. rare interaction). This parameter change enables the system to maintain ease of operation for strong connections while blocking weak or suspicious connections, thus resolving the security-ease of operation contradiction.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies local quality by differentiating the treatment of different social connections based on their individual characteristics. Not all social media connections are treated uniformly; instead, each connection is evaluated based on its specific attributes (interaction frequency, recency, context) and assigned a customized relationship strength score. This allows the system to grant access to trusted connections while denying access to potentially malicious connections, balancing security and convenience.
2Reliability
If relationship strength evaluation is performed for each connection request, then security is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements preliminary action by pre-calculating and storing relationship strength scores in a database before actual network access requests occur. The system continuously monitors and updates connection data (interaction frequency, recency, context) and pre-evaluates relationship strengths. When a connection request arrives, the system simply retrieves the pre-computed score from the database rather than performing complex real-time analysis, significantly reducing the complexity of the access decision process while maintaining high security.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent employs feedback mechanisms where the system continuously monitors connection interactions and updates relationship strength scores based on observed behavior. This feedback loop allows the system to learn from actual usage patterns and adjust future access decisions. The feedback mechanism simplifies complexity by using historical data and established patterns rather than requiring complex real-time analysis for each connection request.
Data Source
AI summary
A method, system and computer program product are disclosed for sharing a crowd sourced wireless network, wherein a first user uses a first device to access a wireless network, and the first device includes an application to grant automatically access to the wireless network to all of a defined group of people. In an embodiment, the method comprises restricting the automatic grant of access to the wireless network by, when one person of said group of people requests access to the network, a network control obtaining a determined strength of a defined relationship between the first user and that person, and granting the person access to the wireless network only if the determined strength of the defined relationship meets one or more set criteria. In an embodiment, the first device uploads a series of relationship scores to a server, and network control receives these scores from the server.