DESCRIPTION COMPUTERISED PAYMENT SYSTEM FOR THE DISTRIBUTION OF DATA AND/OR THE MANAGEMENT OF TRANSACTIONS.

This invention relates to the problem of small transactions and mini payments made by generic users on computerised communication networks, such as, for example the telephone network.

The invention was developed with particular focus on the need of the user to access the data made available by"added value"telephonic services via computer.

-The recent developments of computer. technologies offer such services on the Internet for which payments in most cases is made out with traditional forms, such as, for example, cheques, bank transfers, postal transfers and credit cards, etc. These solutions present, to a variable degree, problems which space from possible delays in the service to security, which in turn can create additional delays. This is because in order to pay by means of cheque, bank transfers, postal transfers, the user must own an account.

Furthermore, the payment medium is slow.

As concerns payments by credit card, potential users may be reluctant to disclose"sensitive"data on the network, such as, for example, the credit card number, aware that-also by effect of the warning messages which repeatedly appear in the network-the network cannot ensure conditions of absolute discretion with reference to such information.

Another problem relates to the fact that the aforesaid media of payment presuppose the need to access and/or have access to specific payment tools, which may vary from country to country.

Another problem relates to the fact that access to the Internet is subjected to the intermediation of a Provider or computerised network manager.

An additional problem relates to the fact that if the operation cannot be continued on the Internet if the web site is flooded with requests.

Although these tools are normally available for commercial users, this may not be so for individuals who acquire certain goods and/or services for which the overall payment amount is modest on an occasional basis (so-called"mini payments").

Since it is not feasible to imagine that such users can equip specifically for carrying out occasional small payments, the most evident consequence is that most individuals will renounce to the possible purchase or to requesting data.

This invention, with the characteristics described in the claims hereof, has the purpose of providing a radical solution aimed at overcoming said problems.

In essence, the solution according to this invention benefits from the concomitant presence of: -a personal computer, modem and connection to a telephone line on behalf of the user; -a consolidated technology of use of telephone networks; -the existence of"added value"fixed network voice telephone services; -computer technologies typically based on a data transmission system in which the user preventively chooses the payment medium and/or data service.

The advantages obtained by means of this invention essentially consist of: -the opportunity for the users to make transactions from their homes; -no forms of surety are required for the payments; no bank and/or postal accounts or credit cards are required; -the user identification by filling out access forms containing personal data is not required, thus avoiding possible violations of the"privacy"protection laws; -computer security is ensured since the user is identified by the manager exclusively on the basis of the user's telephone number and the respective services are charged to the user's telephone bill; -the possibility on behalf of the user to choose, before connecting to the data transmission system, the medium of payment and the data service which the user intends to purchase, predefining the connection time with an"added value"tariff for subsequently downloading files containing the data access codes or other data; -the elimination of forced waiting times on behalf of users due to network bottlenecks; -the service is charged to the user's telephone bill.

The invention will be described with reference to the enclose drawing illustrating the system architecture of this invention in a block diagram as a non-limiting example, whereas: In the enclose drawing diagram, references 1,2,..., n indicate in the general any number of users who can connect to a system for the distribution of data indicated globally with 10.

The connection between the users 1,2,..., n and the system 10 is made according to the normal connection criteria in use in computer communication networks, whereas this is used in its most general meaning.

Consequently, in the most typical form of embodiment of this invention, the respective lines LI, L2,..., Ln used for the connection can be the normal lines of a telephone network, which can be either traditional or advanced (for example, ISDN).

Consequently, a user equipped with a personal computer 11 and respective modem 12 or similar device, such as, for example, a "Minitel"terminal communicating with system 10, can connect to the system 10 via a data line.

It is, consequently, clear that the type and quantity of data which each user can receive from system 10 is correlated to the capacity of communication of the user's system.

An important characteristic of system 10 according to this invention is given by the presence of a network interface 13 (the type of which is known and consequently shall not be described in detail herein) which can handle the calls from various users 1,2,..., n according to the typical modalities of"added value"fixed network voice telephone services charging the service to the user's telephone bill. It may consists of, for example, an interface used to manage the professional"Audiotel"services in the telephone networks.

In system 10 according to this invention, the network interface 13 is used to put the user in contact with a data transmission system 14 in which the users choose the medium of payment and/or type of service which the they intend to purchase beforehand and display on suitable downloading progress bar of the status of the payment download or downloads predefined by the connection time associated to a timing module 15 (which can be implemented with the respective software or managing systems) which cuts off the call when the predefined timeout is reached.

In the diagram illustrated in the figure, reference 14 indicates in general a database containing the data destined to users who access the system 10. 1 1 In general, the database 14 can contain different types of non-vocal data, such as, for example: -text; -graphic data, which can be animated, sound data, multimedia data or other which can be contained and supported in a file in relation to the computer technologies and the download time or data retrieval time defined by the user.

The operation of the database 14 and, in a co-ordinated fashion, of the network interface 13 and/or timing function (s) 15 can be easily controlled with respect to the calls by a processing unit of not high complexity such as, for example, a personal computer 16 of the type currently on the market.

Naturally, the possibility on behalf of the user to explore the database 14 and also the type and quality of the data which results are conditioned by the transmission capacity of which the user can avail.

In synthesis, the system usage modality according to the invention is carried out as follows: User 1, equipped with a personal computer 11 and a modem 12, connects to the system 10 via the telephone line L1 according to the modalities defined by the"added value"fixed voice network telephone services of the"Audiotel"type managed by the network interface 13. At the beginning of the connection to the data transmission service 14, an information screen will appear to inform that the service will be charged. The tariffs are classifie and previously defined and made available to the user who by clicking on the given references will start a timed transaction by downloading the file containing the data access codes or other. The user can display the status of the download or downloads for payment and/or data retrieval on specific download progress bars. At the predefined timeout, the user 1 will automatically be disconnected from the service unless the user has selected various downloads.

Said payment system can be applied or indirectly connected to the forms of electronic marketing commonly implemented on the Internet. I I Said operations are exclusively charged to the user's telephone bill.

An appreciable characteristic is that the application in a system according to this invention is simplifie and globally more cost- effective since it does not require the implementation of programming tools (HTML langage, link and/or meta-tag set-ups, etc.) which are normally required for making web sites on the Internet.

It is clear that the embodiments and implementations may be widely adapted with respect to the description and illustrations hereof without thereby departing from the scope of protection of the present invention.