Linked user accounts

US9626720B2 · kind B2 · utility

Assignee

• Apple Inc. · US

Inventors

• Jeffrey L. Robbin · Los Altos, US
• Eduardo Cue · Mountain View, US
• Evan C. Krasts · Burlingame, US
• Andrew Williams · Mountain View, US
• Maria Ioveva · San Francisco, US
• Patrice Gautier · San Francisco, US
• Steve S. Gedikian · Redwood City, US
• Usama M. Hajj · Bolinas, US

Key dates

• Filing date: Nov 25, 2013
• Grant date: Apr 18, 2017
• Expiry date: May 14, 2035

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G06Q50/01
• WIPO field: IT methods for management
• WIPO sector: Electrical engineering

Abstract

Separate user accounts can be linked into a group of linked user accounts so that content items assigned to each of the user accounts can be accessed by each user account in the group. Linking user accounts in this way allows the individual user accounts to share content items while also retaining their individual properties such as username, password, preference data, etc. Linking user accounts allows each user account to retain the content items assigned to the user account when the user account is unlinked from the group. Linking user accounts can be restricted according to linking rules that dictate how many user accounts can be included in a group, when a user account can be added or removed from a group, etc. A master user account can set parameters restricting content items accessible to the user accounts in the group, as well as money spent be each user account.