Remote access system and method and intelligent agent therefor

Abstract

The invention relates to remote access systems and methods using automatic speech recognition to access a computer system. The invention also relates to an intelligent agent resident on the computer system for facilitating remote access to, and receipt of, information on the computer system through speech recognition or text-to-speech read-back. The remote access systems and methods can be used by a user of the computer system while traveling. The user can dial into a server system which is configured to interact with the user by automatic speech recognition and text-to-speech conversion. The server system establishes a connection to an intelligent agent running on the user's remotely located computer system by packet communication over a public network. The intelligent agent sources information on the user's computer system or a network accessible to the computer system, processes the information and transmits it to the server system over the public network. The server system converts the information into speech signals and transmits the speech signals to a telephone operated by the user.

1 . A method of providing remote access to a computer system over a network, the method comprising the steps of:
 receiving at a server system a voice call from a user of the computer system;   processing information received from the user during the voice call to generate identification information;   authenticating the user based on the identification information;   establishing a connection between the server system and an agent resident on the computer system based at least in part on the identification information;   receiving at the server system a speech command from the user;   at the server, generating first packet data based on said speech commands;   transmitting the first packet data over the network from the server to the agent on the computer system;   at the server system, receiving second packet data from the agent in response to the first packet data; and   generating and transmitting a speech signal to the user the voice call based on the second packet data.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the agent interprets the first packet data, interrogates application software installed on the personal computer and generates the second packet data based on the interrogation. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising receiving at the server system an IP address of the computer system from the agent resident on the computer system and wherein the step of establishing is based on the identification information and the IP address. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 3 , wherein the IP address of the computer system is not fixed and the server system receives the IP address of the computer system from the agent periodically. 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the second packet data corresponds to an object accessible to the computer system. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 5 , wherein the second packet data comprises a summarized form of the object, and wherein the summarized form is generated by the agent based on the object. 
     
     
         7 . A system for providing remote access to a computer system over a network, the system comprising a server system connected to the network and to a telephone network, the server system having computer program code accessible thereto which, when executed by the server system, causes the server system to:
 receive a voice call over the telephone network from a user of the computer system;   receive information and speech commands from the user during the voice call;   determine an IP address of the computer system based at least in part on the information received from the user;   establish a connection with an agent resident on the computer system using the IP address;   generate first packet data based on the speech commands;   transmit the first packet data over the network to the agent on the computer system;   receive second packet data from the agent via the computer system; and   generate and transmit speech signals to the user over the telephone network based on the second packet data.   
     
     
         8 . Computer readable program storage having stored thereon computer program instructions which, when executed on a computer system, cause the computer system to perform the method of providing remote access of  claim 1 . 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising the step of establishing an encrypted connection between the server system and the agent resident on the computer system. 
     
     
         10 . The system of  claim 7 , wherein the computer system is separated from the server system by a firewall and wherein the agent is programmed to periodically transmit an IP address of the computer system to the server system. 
     
     
         11 . The system of  claim 7 , wherein the computer program code executed by the server system, causes the server system to configure a security manager to manage a security policy for authenticating the user. 
     
     
         12 . The system of  claim 7 , wherein the computer program code executed by the server system, causes the server system to configure a security manager to manage a secure connection to the agent on the computer system. 
     
     
         13 . The system of  claim 7 , wherein the computer system has access to a remote server and the user is associated with a user account for the remote server. 
     
     
         14 . The system of  claim 7 , wherein the computer program code executed by the server system, causes the server system to configure a speech server for communicating with the user over the public telephone network using automated speech recognition for received speech commands and automatic text-to-speech conversion for to generate speech signals for transmission to the user. 
     
     
         15 . The system of  claim 14 , further comprising a voice relay server in communication with the speech server and in communication with the agent for receiving data from the agent and for transmitting command request data to the agent corresponding to the speech commands received from the user at the speech server. 
     
     
         16 . The system of  claim 15 , wherein the computer program code executed by the server system causes the server system to maintain a user information datastore; and wherein the voice relay server compares user authentication information received from the user at the speech server to the user information data store to authenticate the user for access to the computer system. 
     
     
         17 . The system of  claim 16 , wherein the user authentication information is determined by the speech server based on an identification utterance received from the user over the public telephone network. 
     
     
         18 . The system of  claim 13 , wherein the remote server hosts a plurality of user accounts and the agent facilitates remote access to each of the user accounts via the server system. 
     
     
         19 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the step of authenticating the user comprises comparing user authentication information received from the user at the speech server to a user information data store. 
     
     
         20 . The method of  claim 1  wherein the speech command received from the user is selected from the group consisting of: retrieving, creating, and modifying data accessible to the agent on the computer system. 
     
     
         21 . The method of  claim 1  comprising the step of receiving a username and password from the user in order to generate identification information. 
     
     
         22 . The system of  claim 15  wherein the voice relay server indexes the speech commands received by the user by maintaining a profile of speech commands for the user, wherein each speech command in the profile of speech commands is associated with a probability based on the frequency of usage by the user; and wherein the voice relay server provides the profile of speech commands for the user to the speech server to facilitate the automated speech recognition of speech commands received from the user.