IP Library Granted Patent US 12,505,138
Granted Patent B1
US 12,505,138 · App. 18/190,795 · Granted Dec 23, 2025

Identifying and ranking potentially privileged documents using a machine learning topic model

Inventors: Ethan Benjamin (New York, NY); Apoorv Agarwal (New York, NY)
Assignee: RELATIVITY ODA LLC
G06F16/3346G06F16/353G06F40/284G06F40/44G06N7/01G06Q50/18
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Quick Facts
Patent No.
US 12,505,138
App. No.
18/190,795
Granted
Dec 23, 2025
Kind
B1
Abstract

A method for identifying and ranking potentially privileged documents using a machine learning topic model may include receiving a set of documents. The method may also include, for each of two or more documents in the set of documents, extracting a set of spans from the document, generating, using a machine learning topic model, a set of topics and a subset of legal topics for the set of spans, generating a vector of probabilities for each span with a probability being assigned to each topic in the set of topics for the span, assigning a score to one or more spans in the set of spans by summing the probabilities in the vector that are assigned to a topic in the subset of legal topics, and assigning a score to the document. The method may further include ranking the two or more documents by their assigned scores.

Claims (70)

1 . A computer-implemented method for identifying and ranking potentially privileged documents using a machine learning topic model, at least a portion of the method being performed by a computer system comprising one or more processors, the method comprising:

receiving, by the computer system, a document;

generating a set of topics for the document by the computer system using a machine learning topic model selected from a group of machine learning topic models consisting of: Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Latent Semantic Analysis, Correlated Topic Modeling, Probabilistic Latent Semantic Analysis, non-negative matrix factorization, Parallel Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Pachinko Allocation Model, lda2vec, Gibbs Sampling Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture, Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture, and derivations thereof;

generating, by the computer system, a vector of probabilities, each of the probabilities corresponding to a topic in the set of topics; and

assigning, by the computer system, a score to the document based on the probabilities in the vector that are assigned to a subset of the topics, the score indicating a potential that the document is privileged.

2 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

labelling, by the computer system, the document as potentially privileged if the document has a score above a certain threshold.

3 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

generating, by the computer system, a master set of topics for the document, the set of topics being a subset of the master set of topics.

4 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

altering, by the computer system, the score assigned to a first span if the first span contains a mention of a legal entity.

5 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

altering, by the computer system, the score assigned to the document if the document contains a mention of a legal entity.

6 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

extracting, by the computer system, a set of spans from the document,

wherein generating a set of topics for the document includes generating a set of topics for each span of the set of spans,

wherein generating the vector of probabilities includes generating a vector of probabilities for each span in the set of spans, and

assigning, by the computer system, a score to one or more spans in the set of spans by mathematically combining the probabilities in the vector that are assigned to a subset of the topics,

wherein assigning the score to the document is based on the scores assigned to the one or more spans in the set of spans.

7 . The method of claim 6 , wherein the assigning, by the computer system, of a score to the one or more spans in the set of spans is not performed for a first span of the one or more spans in the set of spans if at least one of: a language of the first span is unknown or cannot be detected, a number of tokens in the first span is less than a threshold, and the number of tokens in the first span is less than the threshold after names are removed from the first span.

8 . The method of claim 6 , further comprising:

altering, by the computer system, the score assigned to a first span if a sender or a recipient of a document containing the first span is a legal entity.

9 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

receiving, by the computer system, a set of documents that includes the document;

for each document in the set of documents:

generating a set of topics for the document by the computer system using a machine learning topic model selected from a group of machine learning topic models consisting of: Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Latent Semantic Analysis, Correlated Topic Modeling, Probabilistic Latent Semantic Analysis, non-negative matrix factorization, Parallel Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Pachinko Allocation Model, lda2vec, Gibbs Sampling Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture, Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture, and derivations thereof;

obtaining, by the computer system, a vector of probabilities, each of the probabilities corresponding to a topic in the set of topics; and

assigning, by the computer system, a score to the document by summing the probabilities in the vector that are assigned to a subset of the topics, the score indicating a potential that the document is privileged;

creating, by the computer system, a hypergraph comprising a set of entities based on communications between the set of entities in the set of documents; and

weighting, by the computer system, an edge between one or more entities in the set of entities if the communications between the one or more entities is potentially privileged; and

altering, by the computer system, the score assigned to a second document in the set of documents if the second document is a communication between entities with a weighted edge in the hypergraph.

10 . One or more non-transitory computer-readable media comprising one or more computer-readable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of a computer system, cause the computer system to perform the method of claim 1 .

11 . A computer-implemented method for identifying and ranking potentially privileged documents using a machine learning topic model, at least a portion of the method being performed by a computer system comprising one or more processors, the method comprising:

receiving, by the computer system, a document;

generating, by the computer system, a first vector that includes words of the document;

applying, by the computer system, a machine learning topic model to the first vector to generate a set of topics for the document;

generating, by the computer system, a second vector of probabilities, each of the probabilities corresponding to a topic in the set of topics; and

assigning, by the computer system, a score to the document based on the probabilities in the second vector that are assigned to a subset of the topics, the score indicating a potential that the document is privileged.

12 . The method of claim 11 , further comprising:

labelling, by the computer system, the document as potentially privileged if the document has a score above a certain threshold.

13 . The method of claim 11 , further comprising:

generating, by the computer system, a master set of topics for the document, the set of topics being a subset of the master set of topics.

14 . The method of claim 11 , further comprising:

altering, by the computer system, the score assigned to a first span if the first span contains a mention of a legal entity.

15 . The method of claim 11 , further comprising:

altering, by the computer system, the score assigned to the document if the document contains a mention of a legal entity.

16 . The method of claim 11 , further comprising:

extracting, by the computer system, a set of spans from the document,

wherein generating a set of topics for the document includes generating a set of topics for each span of the set of spans,

wherein generating the second vector of probabilities includes generating a second vector of probabilities for each span in the set of spans; and

assigning, by the computer system, a score to one or more spans in the set of spans by mathematically combining the probabilities in the second vector that are assigned to a subset of the topics,

wherein assigning the score to the document is based on the scores assigned to the one or more spans in the set of spans.

17 . The method of claim 16 , wherein the assigning, by the computer system, of a score to the one or more spans in the set of spans is not performed for a first span of the one or more spans in the set of spans if at least one of: a language of the first span is unknown or cannot be detected, a number of tokens in the first span is less than a threshold, and the number of tokens in the first span is less than the threshold after names are removed from the first span.

18 . The method of claim 11 , further comprising:

receiving, by the computer system, a set of documents that includes the document;

for each document in the set of documents:

generating a set of topics for the document by the computer system using a machine learning topic model selected from a group of machine learning topic models consisting of: Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Latent Semantic Analysis, Correlated Topic Modeling, Probabilistic Latent Semantic Analysis, non-negative matrix factorization, Parallel Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Pachinko Allocation Model, lda2vec, Gibbs Sampling Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture, Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture, and derivations thereof;

obtaining, by the computer system, a second vector of probabilities, each of the probabilities corresponding to a topic in the set of topics; and

assigning, by the computer system, a score to the document by summing the probabilities in the second vector that are assigned to a subset of the topics, the score indicating a potential that the document is privileged;

creating, by the computer system, a hypergraph comprising a set of entities based on communications between the set of entities in the set of documents; and

weighting, by the computer system, an edge between one or more entities in the set of entities if the communications between the one or more entities is potentially privileged; and

altering, by the computer system, the score assigned to a second document in the set of documents if the second document is a communication between entities with a weighted edge in the hypergraph.

19 . One or more non-transitory computer-readable media comprising one or more computer-readable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of a computer system, cause the computer system to perform the method of claim 11 .

20 . A system comprising:

one or more processors; and

one or more non-transitory computer-readable media comprising one or more computer-readable instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the system to perform operations, the operations comprising:

receiving a document;

generating a set of topics for the document using a machine learning topic model selected from a group of machine learning topic models consisting of: Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Latent Semantic Analysis, Correlated Topic Modeling, Probabilistic Latent Semantic Analysis, non-negative matrix factorization, Parallel Latent Dirichlet Allocation, Pachinko Allocation Model, lda2vec, Gibbs Sampling Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture, Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture, and derivations thereof;

generating a vector of probabilities, each of the probabilities corresponding to a topic in the set of topics; and

assigning a score to the document based on the probabilities in the vector that are assigned to a subset of the topics, the score indicating a potential that the document is privileged.

Assignments (3)
SECURITY INTEREST Recorded Jan 30, 2026
From: RELATIVITY ODA LLC; TEXT IQ, INC.
To: JPMORGAN CHASE BANK, N.A., AS COLLATERAL AGENT
Reel/Frame 074537/0402 →
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded Nov 18, 2025
From: TEXT IQ, INC.
To: RELATIVITY ODA LLC
Reel/Frame 072947/0185 →
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded Mar 29, 2023
From: BENJAMIN, ETHAN; AGARWAL, APOORV
To: TEXT IQ, INC.
Reel/Frame 063151/0011 →
Continuity (2)
Continuation In Part 16590944 · Oct 2, 2019
Provisional Application 62740775 · Oct 3, 2018
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