Google Inc.

Christopher Lambert

Michael Chu

Rohan Seth

Ravi Kumar Jain

Steven John Lee

Chung-Man Tam

Yan Yu

Tu Tu Tsao

Mike Chu

Yuhua Luo

Steve Lee

The present invention pertains to enhancement or refinement of estimated locations based upon user-specific information. Upon user authorization, geographical information is extracted from a number of user-related sources, including the web browser history, search history, maps history, address book, e-mail archives and calendar entries. Such information is used to build a spatial index of specific physical locations for a geocoded result set. From this, heat maps identifying particular locations from the user-related sources are created for different periods of time. The heat maps may be used to refine an initial location estimate of the user. This may be done by determining whether one or more positions in a given heat map provide a more accurate position of the user than the initial estimate. If so, a best position is selected. This can be used to provide enhanced driving directions to the user.

Refining location estimates and reverse geocoding based on a user profile

A computer program product has a computer-readable storage medium having computer program instructions embodied therein for performing a method for implementing a privacy policy for a user. The method may include the user developing rules that determine whether another user (requester) can access information related to the user. The rules may be stored in a database coupled to a server and evaluated when a request is received from the requester to access the information. If a rule is satisfied by the requester, the server can return the information to the requester. The information can be returned at a level of granularity specified by the user in the satisfied rule. A privacy level can be set by the user to allow access to requesters based on the rules or to deny access to any requesters.

User privacy framework

An alert server is operative to notify users when they are in proximity within one another. The alert server may determine to alert a first user of the proximity of a second user when the second user is in an unusual location. The alert server may determine that the second user is in an unusual location when the second user is outside his or her routine geographic location. The alert server may determine whether the second user is outside his or her routine geographic location by assigning confidence values to geographic locations that the second user has previously visited. The alert sent to the first user may be in the form of a text message, e-mail, or other electronic communication. The first user may receive the alert on a mobile device, such as a cellphone, smartphone, netbook, or other mobile device.

System and method of alerting users based on proximity

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San Francisco, CA, United States of America

Christopher Lambert