Granted Patent B2

US 12,261,848 · App. 18/083,435 · Granted Mar 25, 2025

Inventors: Anumita Biswas (Santa Clara, CA); Karl F. Schramm (Monte Sereno, CA); Benjamin S. Phipps (San Francisco, CA)

Assignee: Apple Inc.

H04L63/102G10L15/22H04L12/2803H04L63/0815H04L63/0861H04L67/306H04L67/60G10L2015/223

Abstract

Claims (51)

1. A method, comprising:

receiving, by one or more servers and from a first device, a request to share a first voice profile corresponding to a first user account associated with the first device, with a second device associated with a second user account, the second device being voice-enabled, the first voice profile being stored on a first data store at the one or more servers, the first data store being associated with the first user account;

responsive to receiving, by the one or more servers, the request from the first device, updating, by the one or more servers, a second data store at the one or more servers to include, in a first secure container associated with the second user account, a reference to the first data store that stores the first voice profile, the second data store further including a second secure container associated with the second user account, the second secure container storing a second voice profile corresponding to the second user account; and

sending, by the one or more servers and to the second device, a notification that the second data store at the one or more servers has been updated to include the reference to the first data store that stores the first voice profile.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

receiving, by the one or more servers and from the second device, a request for the first voice profile;

obtaining, by the one or more servers, the first voice profile from the first data store via the reference stored in the first secure container associated with the second user account; and

providing, by the one or more servers, the first voice profile to the second device.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein receiving the request is based on user input received at the first device, the user input authorizing the one or more servers to share the first voice profile with the second device.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the second data store mirrors the second voice profile from a third data store which does not include or reference the first voice profile.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first data store comprises a first secure container and a second secure container, the first secure container for storing the first voice profile, and the second secure container for storing other voice profiles corresponding to user accounts other than the first user account, wherein the reference to the first data store references the first secure container of the first data store.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

downloading, by the second device and via the second data store, the first voice profile and the second voice profile;

receiving, by the second device, a voice request from a user;

calculating, by the second device, a first confidence score that the user corresponds to the first user account, based on the voice request and the first voice profile; and

calculating, by the second device, a second confidence score that the user corresponds to the second user account, based on the voice request and the second voice profile.

7. The method of claim 6 , further comprising:

determining, by the second device and based on the first and second confidence scores, that the voice request is associated with the first user account; and

providing, by the second device and based on the determining, a response to the voice request based on content that corresponds to the first user account.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the second device is associated with a home account corresponding to the second user account, and

wherein a user of the first user account is identifiable by at least one of a first identifier that uniquely identifies the user with respect to the home account, a second identifier that uniquely identifies the user across multiple devices of the user, a third identifier that identifies the first device as a primary device of the user, or a fourth identifier that uniquely identifies the user with respect to a media content server.

9. A system, comprising:

a first data store;

a second data store;

at least one processor; and

a memory including instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to:

receive a request to share a first voice profile corresponding to a first user account associated with a first device, with a second device associated with a second user account, the second device being voice-enabled, the first voice profile being stored on the first data store which is associated with the first user account;

update the second data store which is associated with the second user account to include, in a first secure container associated with the second user account, a reference to the first data store that includes the first voice profile, the second data store further including a second secure container associated with the second user account, the second secure container storing a second voice profile corresponding to the second user account; and

send, to the second device, a notification that the second data store has been updated to include the reference to the first data store that includes the first voice profile.

10. The system of claim 9 , wherein the at least one processor is further configured to:

receive, from the second device, a request for the first voice profile;

obtain the first voice profile from the first data store via the reference stored in the first secure container associated with the second user account; and

provide the first voice profile to the second device.

11. The system of claim 9 , wherein the request is received based on user input received at the first device, the user input authorizing to share the first voice profile with the second device.

12. The system of claim 9 , wherein the first secure container is for storing references to other data stores that include other voice profiles corresponding to user accounts other than the second user account.

13. The system of claim 9 , wherein the second device is configured to:

download the first voice profile and the second voice profile via the second data store;

receive a voice request from a user;

calculate a first confidence score that the user corresponds to the first user account, based on the voice request and the first voice profile; and

calculate a second confidence score that the user corresponds to the second user account, based on the voice request and the second voice profile.

14. The system of claim 13 , wherein the second device is associated with a home account corresponding to the second user account, and

wherein a user of the first user account is identifiable by at least one of a first identifier that uniquely identifies the user with respect to the home account, a second identifier that uniquely identifies the user across multiple devices of the user, a third identifier that identifies the first device as a primary device of the user, or a fourth identifier that uniquely identifies the user with respect to a media content server.

15. A computer program product comprising code, stored in a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, the code comprising:

code to receive, by one or more servers, a request to share a first voice profile corresponding to a first user account associated with a first device, with a second device associated with a second user account, the second device being voice-enabled, the first voice profile being stored on a first data store at the one or more servers, the first data store being associated with the first user account;

code to update, by the one or more servers, a second data store at the one or more servers to store, in a first secure container associated with the second user account, a reference to the first data store, the second data store further including a second secure container associated with the second user account, the second secure container storing a second voice profile corresponding to the second user account;

code to send, by the one or more servers and to the second device based on the received request to share, a notification that the second data store at the one or more servers has been updated to include the reference to the first voice profile;

code to receive, by the one or more servers, from the second device and responsive to the notification, a request for the first voice profile; and

code to transmit, by the one or more servers, the first voice profile from the first data store associated with the first user account to the second device via the reference to the first data store stored in the second data store at the one or more servers and responsive to the request for the first voice profile.

16. The computer program product of claim 15 , wherein the request is received based on user input received at the first device, the user input authorizing to share the first voice profile with the second device.

17. The computer program product of claim 15 , wherein the second data store at the one or more servers mirrors the second voice profile from a third data store at the one or more servers which does not include or reference the first voice profile, the third data store being separate from the first and second data stores.

18. The computer program product of claim 15 , wherein the second data store is partitioned into the first secure container and the second secure container, and the first secure container is for storing the reference to the first voice profile and references to other voice profiles corresponding to user accounts other than the second user account.

Continuity (3)

References Cited (23)