Signal monitoring apparatus analyzing voice communication content

Abstract

A signal monitoring apparatus and method involving devices for monitoring signals representing communications traffic, devices for identifying at least one predetermined parameter by analyzing the context of the at least one monitoring signal, a device for recording the occurrence of the identified parameter, a device for identifying the traffic stream associated with the identified parameter, a device for analyzing the recorded data relating to the occurrence, and a device, responsive to the analysis of the recorded data, for controlling the handling of communications traffic within the apparatus.

What is claimed is: 
     
       1. A signal monitoring system for monitoring and analyzing voice communications passing through a monitoring point, the system comprising:
 a digital voice recorder ( 18 ) for operable to monitoring two-way conversation traffic streams passing through the a monitoring point, said digital voice recorder having connections ( 20 ) for being operatively attached coupled to the monitoring point; 
 a digital processor ( 30 ) connecteda speech analysis engine operable to analyze voice communications received by the system, the speech analysis engine being coupled to said digital voice recorder forand operable to identifying at least one non-speech recognition predetermined parameter by analyzing the voice communication content of at least one monitored signal taken from the traffic streams; and 
 a recorder ( 38 ) attached to said digital processor speech analysis engine for recording occurrences of the non-speech recognition predetermined parameter;, 
 a traffic stream identifier ( 36 ) for identifying the traffic stream associated with the predetermined parameter; 
 a data analyzer ( 36 ) connected to said digital processor for analyzing the recorded data relating to the occurrences; and 
 a communication traffic controller ( 34 ) operatively connected to said data analyzer and, operating responsive to the analysis of the recorded data, for controlling the handling of communications traffic within said monitoring system 
 wherein the speech analysis engine automatically identifies an occurrence of said at least one non-speech recognition predetermined parameter in a voice interaction. 
 
     
     
       2. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said at least one non-speech recognition predetermined parameter includes a frequency of keywords identified in the voice communication content of the at least one monitored signal. 
     
     
       3. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said digital processor speech analysis engine further identifies episodes of anger or shouting by analyzing amplitude envelope. 
     
     
       4. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said at least one non-speech recognition predetermined parameter is a prosody of the voice communication content of the at least one monitored signal. 
     
     
       5. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said connections for being operatively attached to the telephony exchange switch are attached via high impedance taps ( 20 ) to telephone signal lines ( 24 ,  26 ) attached to said telephony exchange switch. 
     
     
       6. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said communication traffic controller serves speech analysis engine is operable to identify at least one section of traffic relative to another so as to identify a source of the non-speech recognition predetermined parameter. 
     
     
       7. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said further comprising a communication traffic controller serves operable to influence further monitoring actions within the apparatus system. 
     
     
       8. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein the analyzed contents of the at least one monitored signal comprise the interaction between at least two signals representing an at least two-way conversation. 
     
     
       9. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein the recorder speech analysis engine operates in real time to provide a real-time indication of the occurrence. 
     
     
       10. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said digital voice recorder comprises an analog/digital convertor ( 18 ) converter for converting analog voice into a digital signal. 
     
     
       11. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said digital processor speech analysis engine is a Digital Signal Processor ( 30 ) digital signal processor arranged to operate in accordance with an analyzing algorithm. 
     
     
       12. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein the digital signal processor is arranged to operate in real time. 
     
     
       13. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , further comprising a replay station ( 32 ) connected to said digital processor speech analysis engine and arranged such that the voice communication content of the at least one monitored signal can be recorded and monitored by said digital processor speech analysis engine for identifying the at least one non-speech recognition parameter at some later time. 
     
     
       14. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein the at least one non-speech recognition predetermined parameter comprises plural predetermined parameters and wherein said digital voice recorder records the occurrence of the plural predetermined parameters in each of the two directions of traffic separately. 
     
     
       15. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said traffic stream identifier speech analysis engine comprises a means for receiving an identifier tagged onto the traffic so as to identify its source. 
     
     
       16. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said digital voice recorder for monitoring the traffic streams is operative responsive to an output from said traffic stream identifier speech analysis engine identifying the source of the conversation in which the non-speech recognition predetermined parameter has been identified, or a threshold occurrence of the non-speech recognition predetermined parameter has been exceeded. 
     
     
       17. The monitoring system of  claim 1 , wherein said digital voice recorder, said digital processor, said recorder, said traffic stream identifier, and said data analyzer speech analysis engine, reside on an add-in card to a telecommunications system. 
     
     
       18. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the telecommunications system comprises an automatic call distributor. 
     
     
       19. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the speech analysis engine is operable to examine incoming and outgoing traffic streams to determine whether a talk-over condition exists with respect to the voice interaction. 
     
     
       20. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the speech analysis engine is operable to examining incoming or outgoing traffic streams to determine whether one or more of a predetermined group of words exists with respect to the voice interaction. 
     
     
       21. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the speech analysis engine is operable to examine incoming or outgoing traffic streams to identify stress on either or both sides of the voice interaction. 
     
     
       22. The monitoring system of claim 21, wherein stress is identified by determining changes in volume, speed and tone of speech. 
     
     
       23. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the speech analysis engine is operable to examine incoming or outgoing traffic streams to identify anger on either or both sides of the voice interaction. 
     
     
       24. The monitoring system of claim 23, wherein anger is identified by analyzing a voice envelope associated with the incoming or outgoing traffic streams. 
     
     
       25. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the speech analysis engine is operable to examine incoming and outgoing traffic streams to identify delay between transmissions in opposite directions. 
     
     
       26. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the speech analysis engine receives voice interactions via the digital voice recorder. 
     
     
       27. The monitoring system of claim 26, wherein voice interactions are analyzed after the voice interactions are complete. 
     
     
       28. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the speech analysis engine receives voice interactions via a tap, the speech analysis engine being operable to analyze the voice interactions substantially in real-time. 
     
     
       29. The monitoring system of claim 28, wherein the speech analysis engine is operable to direct the digital voice recorder to record an interaction based upon the occurrence of one or more of said at least non-speech recognition one predetermined parameter. 
     
     
       30. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the two-way conversation traffic streams comprise packetized voice data. 
     
     
       31. The monitoring system of claim 1, wherein the speech analysis engine is operable to instruct the digital voice recorder to highlight a record associated with a voice interaction based upon the occurrence of one or more of said at least one non-speech recognition predetermined parameter.