Social Network Financial Account Linking via Intermediary Mediation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Social networking systems lack the ability to access and utilize information about user actions performed outside of their platform, limiting their understanding of user interests and preferences.
Innovation Solution
Users can associate their financial accounts with their social networking system profiles, allowing the platform to access transaction history and provide incentives for doing so, such as credits for future purchases, while maintaining privacy settings to control data access.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of information
If the social networking system collects more information about users from external sources, then the understanding of user interests and preferences is improved, but user privacy and security are compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces financial institutions as intermediaries between users and the social networking system. Users link their financial accounts to their social networking profiles, allowing the system to access transaction information through the financial institution intermediary. This mediator enables information collection while maintaining user control through privacy settings and secure authentication protocols.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements preliminary user authorization and privacy setting configuration before any information is collected. Users must explicitly link their financial accounts and configure their privacy preferences in advance, giving them control over what information is shared. This preliminary action ensures user consent is obtained before data collection begins.
2Loss of information
If the social networking system accesses financial account information, then content relevance and user engagement are improved, but system complexity and security requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the information collection and processing system into distinct modular components: user profile management, financial account linking interface, privacy setting configuration, authentication module, and data analysis engine. Each component handles specific tasks independently, reducing overall system complexity while enabling comprehensive functionality.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent uses financial institutions as technical intermediaries that handle secure authentication and data transmission. Rather than building complex security infrastructure from scratch, the system leverages the existing secure protocols and infrastructure of financial institutions, significantly reducing the complexity of implementing secure financial data access.
3Loss of information
If users link their financial accounts to their profile, then the social networking system gains insights into user preferences, but users lose control over their financial information
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamic privacy settings that allow users to flexibly control what information is shared. Users can adjust their privacy preferences at any time, selecting which financial account categories to share, with whom to share information, and to what extent. This dynamic control mechanism maintains user agency while enabling information sharing.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent provides users with feedback mechanisms that show them what information is being collected, how it is being used, and who has access to it. Users receive notifications about data access and can review their shared information, ensuring continuous awareness and control over their financial data.
Data Source
AI summary
A social networking system associates a financial account identified by a user with a user profile maintained by the social networking system for the user. The social networking system may compensate the user for associating the financial account with the user profile by crediting the identified financial account by an amount. The credit may be applied to subsequent purchases by the user at a vendor identified by the user. To simplify vendor selection, the social networking system may suggest one or more candidate pages associated with vendors to the user. Information in a transaction history of the financial account and in the user profile may be used to identify the candidate pages, allowing the user to select a vendor with which the user has previously transacted by selecting a candidate page associated with the vendor.