Carrier IQ Downplays 2010 Patent Request

Firm sought patent for tech it said could read content selection, location data and app activity on mobile devices

By Jaikumar Vijayan

December 06, 2011 — Computerworld — A Carrier IQ executive Monday downplayed the significance of the company's effort to patent a technology it said can help wireless carriers undertake "advertising audience segmentation analysis and content copyright analytics."

The company applied for a patent for the so-called Service Intelligence Module Program Product in March, 2010.

The application says that the technology can, among other things, combine and analyze "service intelligence modules related to games, financial transactions, and medical diagnostics."

The patent application asserts that the technology would let carriers "configure a processor to read content selection, read location data, read application activity, and determine presentation/deselection of advertising messages." It also claims that the product could be used to "group identifiers of mobile device users who have a higher probability of occupying a certain geographical area," as well as provide carriers with a "means for tracing copyright ownership of content displayed on the device."

In an interview yesterday, Carrier IQ marketing vice president Andrew Coward downplayed the claims in the patent application and emphatically contended that none of the company's current products offer the capabilities described. The Service Intelligence Module Program Product would offer much broader capabilities than Carrier IQ prodcts offer today, he said.

Coward said that while there are many different ways Carrier IQ technology can be used, its products today are focused solely on improving wireless network and handset performance.

"In the formative years of the company, we recognized there were multiple uses for our technology on the handset and sought to ensure that others would not be able to leverage what we do," Coward said. Thus the company filed the patent application last year, he added.

"We absolutely recognize the power of our technology to extend into additional areas. But [the company has] found that, as with all start-ups, it is essential to focus on what you do well, which in our case is delivering detailed analytics on why phones and networks don't always work to consumer's satisfaction," he said.

"Today, we are focused 100% on customer quality of experience for wireless devices and networks providing tools for customer care and network planning and optimization," Coward said.

In recent days, Carrier IQ has been at the center of a major privacy controversy prompted by Connecticut security researcher Trevor Eckhart's report that describes Carrier IQ's current software product as a hard to detect and even harder to remove data collector. The report said that the tool can be used for highly intrusive tracking of Android, BlackBerry and other smartphone users.