A method and system for placing an order to purchase an item via the Internet. The order is placed by a purchaser at a client system and received by a server system. The server system receives purchaser information including identification of the purchaser, payment information, and shipment information from the client system. The server system then assigns a client identifier to the client system and associates the assigned client identifier with the received purchaser information. The server system sends to the client system the assigned client identifier and an HTML document identifying the item and including an order button. The client system receives and stores the assigned client identifier and receives and displays the HTML document. In response to the selection of the order button, the client system sends to the server system a request to purchase the identified item. The server system receives the request and combines the purchaser information associated with the client identifier of the client system to generate an order to purchase the item in accordance with the billing and shipment information whereby the purchaser effects the ordering of the product by selection of the order button.

Method and system for placing a purchase order via a communications network

This invention relates to methods for controlling and monitoring access to network servers. In particular, the process described in the invention includes client-server sessions over the Internet. In this environment, when the user attempts to access an access-controlled file, the server subjects the request to a secondary server which determines whether the client has an authorization or valid account. Upon such verification, the user is provided with a session identification which allows the user to access to the requested file as well as any other files within the present protection domain.

Internet server access control and monitoring systems

Distributed software subjects face the problem of determining one another's trustworthiness. The problem considered is managing the exchange of credentials between strangers for the purpose of property-based authentication and authorization when credentials are sensitive. An architecture for trust negotiation between client and server is presented. The notion of a trust negotiation strategy is introduced and examined with respect to an abstract model of trust negotiation. Two strategies with very different properties are defined and analyzed. A language of credential expressions is presented, with two example negotiations illustrating the two negotiation strategies. Ongoing work on policies governing credential disclosure and trust negotiation is summarized.

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Automated trust negotiation

The content of free speech over distributed networks, such as the Internet, is often inappropriate for minors as well as offensive to some adults. The invention comprises an advisory server operated by, for example, a third party watchdog group, which rates the content of data downloaded from a content server to a client in order to block or censor unwanted material. In operation, each time data (e.g., a web page) is downloaded from a content server to the client, prior to display, the client sends a request signal to the advisory server asking that it advise the client on the content of the web page. The advisory server rates the page and sends a classification rating back to the client. The client thereafter displays or does not display the web page according to the classification rating based on the client's selected preferences. The advisory server may also assign a rating to any links contained on the web page or may also be asked by the client to block any pages which require a fee. In this manner parents are effectively empowered control the content of data disseminated in their homes.

System and method for controlling access to data located on a content server

A method and system for performing user authorization in a multi-user computer system. The novel method has particular application to the multi-user internet protocol. Within the system, an application contains a list of registered users. For each registered user, the application stores a user identification, an email (electronic mail) address, and a database containing each authorized IP address for that user. When a user requests access to the application over the multi-user system, the application requires the user to input a user identification value and, simultaneously, the application accesses the user's current IP address (e.g., the user's internet domain address) over the multi-user system. The application attempts to validate the user identification, and if valid, the application examines its database to determine if the user is authorized for its current IP address. If so, access is permitted. If the user identification is valid but the current IP address is not authorized, the application determines a validation key ("key") based on the user identification and the current IP address. The pseudo unique key is then forwarded via the email protocol to the user's known email address. The user then is required to enter that key into the application to authorized the current IP address. Security is provided because (1) given a user identification, which can be stolen, the unauthorized user also needs to access the application using an authorized IP address and (2) email is used to transmit the keys to the user to a known user email address.

Method and system for user authorization over a multi-user computer system

Security issues are the major roadblock currently preventing greater access to databases over the Internet. In this paper, we propose a framework for secure access to databases by a wide audience over the Internet, using World Wide Web information servers, a modified version of the NCSA Mosaic Internet browser and role wrappers (software modules that assign roles to incoming database requests, based on the credentials submitted with the request). We also describe an application embodying this framework. >

R. McCool

Papers

Secure access to data over the Internet