Determining events by analyzing stored electronic communications
Among other things, an aspect includes a data storage system associated with a provider entity and storing data on behalf of a client entity, the data being accessible from the data storage system by the client entity, a data interface enabling access by the provider entity to the data of the data storage system, and an analysis engine maintained by the provider entity to, at times determined by the analysis engine, access the data using the data interface, analyze the data, and generate results of the analysis for use by the client entity.
1. An apparatus comprising:
a data storage system associated with a provider entity and storing data on behalf of a client entity, the data being accessible from the data storage system by the client entity;
a data interface enabling access by the provider entity to the data of the data storage system; and
an analysis engine comprising a processor and memory maintained by the provider entity, the analysis engine configured to, at discrete intervals determined by the analysis engine:
access the data using the data interface;
analyze the data, comprising:
identify, among the data, electronic communications, wherein at least some of the electronic communications include data identifying a sender or a receiver associated with the client entity, the sender or receiver being an employee of the client entity;
identify one or more elements of data that occur in one or more of the electronic communications and meet a threshold frequency of occurrence; and
compare the elements of data identified to one or more elements of data occurring in electronic communications identified at multiple previous discrete intervals; and
generate a business report comprising one or more analysis summaries, each of the one or more analysis summaries includes results of the analysis for use by the client entity, wherein the results provide informational data associated with at least one or more of communication patterns of at least one employee of the client entity, discussion topics of at least one employee of the client entity, and document security associated with at least one employee of the client entity, wherein the informational data is related to at least one of the identified elements of data,
wherein the business report is generated at times determined based on the results of the analysis and the user's preferences for receiving information.
2. The apparatus of claim 1 , comprising a client interface to receive updates of the data from the client entity.
3. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the analysis is performed on a subset of the data that is associated with a specified period of time.
4. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the analysis comprises an identification of patterns in the data.
5. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the data received from the client entity comprises electronic messages.
6. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the results are provided to the client entity in electronic messages.
7. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the results are provided to the client entity at times based on characteristics of the results.
8. The apparatus of claim 7 , in which the characteristics of the results comprise an event identified by the analysis engine as a priority event.
9. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the data storage system stores data received from a second client entity.
10. The apparatus of claim 9 , in which the data received from the client entity is not accessible to the second client entity.
11. The apparatus of claim 9 , in which the analysis engine generates the results partially based on an analysis of the data received from the second client entity.
12. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the provider entity is independent of the client entity.
13. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the client entity comprises a commercial enterprise.
14. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the results are generated based on two instances of data analysis each performed at two different times.
15. The apparatus of claim 1 , in which the data is accessible from the data storage system by the client entity on a network shared with entities other than the client entity and the provider entity.
16. The apparatus of claim 1 , the data being accessible from the data storage system by the provider entity at times determined by the provider entity for the provider entity to perform continuous analysis of the data with permission of the client entity.
17. The apparatus of claim 1 , comprising: a software interface maintained by a provider entity and providing access to the provider entity to data stored by a data storage system on behalf of a client entity, wherein the extent of the access is tailored to applications that access and analyze the data at times determined by the provider entity.