Method and System for Providing Enhanced Caller Identification

The present invention relates generally to telecommunications services and more particularly to caller identification.

Telecommunications service providers typically offer services that attempt to provide customers with information that enables them to determine whether or not to accept a call before answering the call. One service that provides such information is caller identification ("Caller ID"). Standard Caller ID services generally provide a customer with an indication of who is calling without requiring the customer to answer the call. These systems typically retrieve information about the calling party from a database and provide that information to the called party. Customer premise equipment (CPE) in the form of a display device is generally used to provide the called party with a visual readout of the name and/or telephone number associated with the calling party.

However, the effectiveness of Caller ID systems can be reduced due to a number of different occurrences. One such occurrence is the inability of a service provider to provide the standard Caller ID information for a particular incoming call. A service provider may not be able to provide the standard Caller ID information if the Caller ID information is blocked by the calling party, or if the Caller ID information is unavailable or incomplete. Also, the service provider may not be able to provide the standard Caller ID information if the call is marked "Private," indicating that the calling party has taken steps to suppress transmission of Caller ID information. This may be done, for example, by pressing *67 when initiating a call

When the standard Caller ID information cannot be provided, the called party is not adequately informed about who is calling and cannot determine whether or not to accept the incoming call before answering the call. Because the effectiveness of Caller ID systems is greatly reduced when information cannot be provided, an improved system and method for providing caller identification information that overcome these deficiencies are needed.

Patent application Ser. No. 09/122,484, filed Jul. 24, 1998 and commonly assigned to the assignee of the present application, is incorporated herein by reference. This patent application discloses a method and system for providing a called party with audible caller identification information when standard caller identification cannot be provided. When standard caller identification cannot be provided, the call is blocked and a request for audible caller identification is transmitted to the calling party. The audible information is subsequently transmitted to the called party.

The effectiveness of this system is limited in telecommunication systems which provide per line blocking of Caller ID information. When per line blocking is activated for a subscriber line, the Caller ID information for that line is never transmitted by the system. However, the system described in patent application Ser. No. 09/122,484 requires communication of the called party's identification information among the equipment of the system for proper operation. If per line blocking is present, the disclosed system can not process the call. Customers who have selected per line blocking, for privacy or other purposes, can not use the described caller identification system of patent application Ser. No. 09/122,484.

Accordingly, there is a need for a system and method which permits provision of either text or audible caller identification information even to a customer who subscribes to a per line blocking service.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a telecommunications system; and

FIG. 2 is a call flow diagram illustrating a method for processing a call in the telecommunications system of FIG. 1.

By way of introduction, the preferred embodiments described below include a method and system for providing a called party with audible caller identification information when standard caller identification information cannot be provided, even when the called party subscribes to a per line blocking service. In one embodiment, calls for which standard caller identification information is blocked, unavailable or incomplete are prevented from being connected to the called party. A forward call message is transmitted with the directory number of the called party contained in a normally unused data field. A presentation indicator for the directory number is set in the forward call message to presentation allowed so that blocking of the called party's identification information does not occur.

In response to the forward call message, a request for audible caller identification information is transmitted to the calling party. If the calling party provides the requested audible caller identification information, the audible information is transmitted to the called party. Caller identification information can thus be provided to the called party when standard caller identification information cannot be provided, even in the presence of per line blocking of the customer's identification information.

Referring now to the drawing, FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a telecommunications system 100. The system 100 comprises a service switching point (SSP) 102, a signal transfer point (STP) 104, a service control point (SCP) 106, a first SCP database 108, a second SCP database 110, a compact service node (CSN) 112, a central office 114, called telephone station 116 and calling telephone station 118. Intelligent network system components, commonly referred to as advanced intelligent network (AIN) components, suitable for implementing the present embodiment are commercially available from several vendors and are known to those skilled in the art. AIN components can implement computer readable program code as known to those skilled in the art. Vendors of AIN components typically have a preferred programming language and operating platform as known to those skilled in the art.

SSP 102 preferably comprises an AIN switch that routes calls, recognizes and responds to triggers, generates queries to obtain call information and responds to returned call information. SSP 102 connects called telephone station 116 with central office 114 to enable calls to be placed between called telephone station 116 and calling telephone station 118. SSP 102 preferably communicates with SCP 106, central office 114 and CSN 112 by utilizing a signaling protocol such as Signaling System 7 (SS7) or other such signaling protocols as presently known to those skilled in the art or developed in the future. SSP 102 preferably generates queries to SCP 102 and receives and responds to responses to the queries returned from SCP 106. In the illustrated embodiment, communication between the SSP 102 and the SCP 106 employs Transaction Capabilities Applications Protocol or TCAP.

STP 104 preferably comprises a network element that transfers signaling communications in response to signaling protocols such as SS7 or other such signaling protocols as presently known to those skilled in the art or developed in the future. STP 104 preferably transfers queries from SSP 106 to SCP 106 and transfers responses to the queries from SCP 106 to SSP 102.

SCP 106 preferably comprises an AIN element that stores call information and receives and responds to queries. SCP 106 preferably stores call control information in the first SCP database 108 and can access the stored call control information. SCP 106 also stores standard caller identification information in the second SCP database 110 and can access the stored caller identification information. SCP 106 receives queries generated by SSP 102 and preferably responds to the queries by performing database searches to locate the requested call control information or caller identification information as known to those skilled in the art. SCP 106 can forward the call control information or caller identification information to SSP 102.

CSN 112 preferably comprises a network element that enables communications between telephone stations 116, 118 and the network. CSN 112 can preferably transmit messages to and receive responses from telephone stations 116, 118. CSN 112 can generate announcements that can be transmitted to telephone stations 116, 118. CSN 112 can transmit responses such as audible caller identification information from telephone station 118 to telephone station 116 by connecting telephone stations 118, 116 or by recording and playing back the responses as known to those skilled in the art. The announcements transmitted to telephone station 116 preferably comprise accept and reject options along with requests for input from the telephone station 116. The requests for input preferably comprise requests for input that can be used by CSN 112 to cancel calls to telephone station 116, connect calls to telephone station 116, forward calls to a voice mail system or another location such as another telephone line, and transmit messages to telephone station 118. As used herein, the term voice mail system means all types of message recording systems as known to those skilled in the art. CSN 112 can preferably receive and respond to the input transmitted from telephone station 116. The term input means any suitable signal such as DTMF tones, voice input, dial pulse input or modem/fax input as known to those skilled in the art.

In alternative embodiments, other system equipment may provide the functions provided by CSN 112. For example, equivalent functionality may be provided by an AIN service node or by an Intelligent Peripheral, as those terms are understood in the art. These components and others which are operationally equivalent may be substituted for the CSN 112 in FIG. 1.

Database 108 preferably comprises a data storage element for use with SCP 106 as known to those skilled in the art. Database 108 preferably stores call control information that can be implemented by SSP 102 to control calls. Such call control information is known to those skilled in the art.

Database 110 preferably comprises a standard caller identification with name database as known to those skilled in the art. Database 110 preferably includes the name of the person associated with calling telephone station 118 along with the telephone number that is associated with calling telephone station 118. Database 110 can alternatively comprise a caller assistance database as known to those skilled in the art. While databases 108, 110 are depicted within a telecommunications system, databases 108, 110 can comprise any suitable databases containing information adapted for use in the present embodiment and are not limited to databases located within a telecommunications network. It is also important to note that while databases 108, 110 are shown as separate components, they can be implemented as a single database.

Central office 114 preferably comprises an AIN network switch as known to those skilled in the art. Central office 114 enables calls to be placed between calling telephone station 118 and called telephone station 116. Alternatively, central office 114 can comprise a non-AIN network switch as known to those skilled in the art.

Telephone stations 116, 118 preferably comprise analog telephone sets as known to those skilled in the art. Alternatively, telephone stations 116, 118 can comprise wireless, PCS, ISDN or any other form of communication station known to those skilled in the art. Called telephone station 116 preferably includes CPE equipment for use with caller identification services as known to those skilled in the art.

FIG. 2 is a call flow diagram illustrating a method for processing a call in the telecommunications system 100 of FIG. 1. FIG. 2 illustrates communication between SSP 102, SCP 106 and CSN 112 for processing the call.

At step 202, the calling party at the calling telephone station 118 calls the directory number (DN) of the called communication station 116. The calling party may choose to enable Calling Number Delivery Blocking, for example, by dialing *67 before dialing the DN of the called communication station 116. This will block delivery of the standard caller ID information for the calling telephone station 118. In some systems, portions of the telecommunications system 100 such as the trunk group terminating the call may not pass the standard Caller ID information.

At step 204, the terminating SSP 102 recognizes that a terminating attempt trigger (TAT) is assigned to the called directory number. In response to the TAT, the SSP 102 creates a Termination.sub.-- Attempt query message and transmits the query message to the SCP 106 for analysis. In the illustrated embodiment using AIN elements, the query message is formatted according to AIN Release 0.1 TCAP. The query message includes several parameters as is known to those ordinarily skilled in the art. For the Termination.sub.-- Attempt query message, the following parameters are specified:

If the calling party has blocked the standard Caller ID information, or if the system does not pass the standard Caller ID information for the calling communication station, the CallingPartyID parameter of the TAT query message will not be available. The Presentation Restriction Indicator parameter will be set to one of the binary values 01 or 10 to indicate this condition. This is in contrast to the situation in which the standard Caller ID information is available and the Presentation Restriction Indicator parameter is set to 00, to indicate presentation allowed.

In response to the Termination.sub.-- Attempt query, the SCP 106 will validate the Presentation Restriction Indicator parameter of the CallingPartyID parameter. If the indicator is set to Presentation Restriction (01) or Number Unavailable (10), the SCP 106 will pass routing information to the SSP 102 in a Forward.sub.-- Call response message, step 206. In the illustrated embodiment using AIN elements, the response message is formatted according to AIN Release 0.1 TCAP. The response message includes several parameters as is known to those ordinarily skilled in the art.

In a first embodiment, for the Forward.sub.-- Call query message, the following parameters are specified:

Thus, in this first embodiment, the SCP 106 detects the CalledPartyID parameter of the Termination.sub.-- Attempt query received from the SSP 102. As noted above, this parameter is set to the DN of the called party, or the directory number of the called telephone station. The SCP 106 places this value in the Forward.sub.-- Call response for the CallingPartyID parameter. The CallingPartyID parameter of the Forward.sub.-- Call response has an associated Presentation Restriction Indicator parameter. The SCP 106 marks this Presentation Restriction Indicator as presentation allowed.

In this manner, the system and method according to the first embodiment avoids the problems that arise when the called party subscribes to a per line blocking service. When per line blocking is activated, the system equipment including the SCP 106 and the SSP 102 is prevented from transmitting the Caller ID information for the called party. In subsequent processing by the system 100, the SSP 102 lacks the called telephone station directory number to complete the call back to the called telephone station. In the illustrated embodiment, the called telephone station DN is read from the TAT query and placed in the CallingPartyID parameter of the Forward.sub.-- Call response. The SSP 102 can subsequently read the value of this parameter, avoiding the per line blocking limitation.

In a second embodiment, a different parameter is used in Forward.sub.-- Call response message for communicating the called telephone station's DN. This parameter is the RedirectingPartyID. In this embodiment, the SCP 106 places the CalledPartyID DN from the Termination.sub.-- Attempt query message into the RedirectingPartyID of the Forward.sub.-- Call response message. The RedirectingPartyID has an associated Presentation Restriction Indicator parameter. The SCP 106 sets the associated Presentation Restriction Indicator parameter to presentation allowed. In this embodiment, the Forward.sub.-- Call query message has parameters specified as follows:

In this manner, the system and method according to the second embodiment avoids the problems that arise when the called party subscribes to a per line blocking service.

At step 208, the SSP 102 receives the Forward.sub.-- Call response message and originates a new call for the forwarded leg. The SSP 102 merges the new originating call and the existing terminating call. That is, the SSP 102 bridges or reconfigures the call. At this point, the SSP 102 routes the call as if it received an Analyze.sub.-- Route message, using the CalledPartyID in the Forward.sub.-- Call message to identify the new party. In the first embodiment described above, the CallingPartyID is the DN to which the termination attempt trigger is assigned. In the second embodiment, the redirecting number is the DN to which the termination attempt trigger is assigned. The SSP 102 forwards the call to the CSN 112.

At step 210, the forwarded call is answered by the CSN 112. The CSN 112 is operative to generate an announcement that is transmitted to the calling telephone station 118. One example of a suitable announcement is "The party you are calling does not accept calls from unidentified numbers. At the tone, say your name or the company you represent and your call will be completed." The CSN 112 then detects a response. If the calling party provides a response, the response is recorded as audible caller identification information for subsequent playback to the called party. If no response of provided, the call is terminated.

At step 212, the CSN 112 originates a new call to the called telephone station 116. In the first embodiment described above, the CSN 112 originates the new call to the DN found in the CallingPartyID parameter of the Forward Call response message. The parameter was set to the DN to which the TAT is assigned. In the second embodiment described above, the CSN 112 originates the new call using the DN found in the RedirectingPartyID parameter of the Forward.sub.-- Call response message. The parameter was set to the DN to which the TAT is assigned.

At step 214, the SSP 102 recognizes that a terminating attempt trigger (TAT) is assigned to the called DN. Based on the TAT, the SSP 102 creates a termination.sub.-- attempt query message and transmits the query message to the SCP 106 for analysis. The parameters required for the AIN release 0.1 TCAP query message in the illustrated embodiment are as follows:

At step 216, the service logic of the SCP 106 will validate the Presentation Restriction Indicator of the CallingPartyID parameter of the query message. If the indicator is equal to Presentation Allowed, the SCP 106 will create an Authorize.sub.-- Termination response message and send it to the SSP 102. The parameters required for the AIN release 0.1 TCAP response message in the illustrated embodiment are as follows:

At step 218, when the called party answers the called telephone station 116, in the illustrated embodiment the CSN 112 first plays an identifying message and requests a keypress input. This ensures that a human is present to answer the called telephone station 116 and distinguishes the case where a modem, fax or other equipment answers the called telephone station 116. If the called party accepts the call, the CSN 112 connects the original calling party at the calling telephone station 118 to the called party at the called telephone station 116.

As can be seen from the foregoing, the present embodiments provide a system and method for delivering audible caller identification information when standard Caller ID information can not be provided, even when a subscriber to the service has per line blocking. The SCP detects the directory number to which a terminating attempt trigger is assigned and places this directory number in a parameter for transmission to the SSP using a forward.sub.-- call message. The per line blocking function does not interfere with transmission of this parameter so that the called party's directory number can be passed for processing and call completion by the system.

It is to be understood that a wide range of changes and modifications to the embodiments described above will be apparent to those skilled in the art and are contemplated. It is therefore intended that the foregoing detailed description be regarded as illustrative rather than limiting, and that it be understood that it is the following claims, including all equivalents, that are intended to define the spirit and scope of the invention.