US Patent 8065146 Detecting an answering machine using speech recognition

An answering machine detection module is used to determine whether a call recipient is an actual person or an answering machine. The answering machine detection module includes a speech recognizer and a call analysis module. The speech recognizer receives an audible response of the call recipient to a call. The speech recognizer processes the audible response and provides an output indicative of recognized speech. The call analysis module processes the output of the speech recognizer to generate an output indicative of whether the call recipient is a person or an answering machine.