Prosecution Insights
Last updated: October 27, 2026
Application No. 16/835,898

SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR PUSHING UNIVERSAL PROFILE UPDATES

Non-Final OA §103
Filed
Mar 31, 2020
Priority
Jan 30, 2020 — provisional 62/967,959
Examiner
BALLOU, MAAME BOAKYEWAA
Art Unit
3629
Tech Center
3600 — Transportation & Electronic Commerce
Assignee
Proofpoint Inc.
OA Round
10 (Non-Final)
17%
Grant Probability
At Risk
10-11
OA Rounds
0m
Est. Remaining
36%
With Interview

Examiner Intelligence

Grants only 17% of cases
17%
Career Allowance Rate
70 granted / 403 resolved
-34.6% vs TC avg
Strong +19% interview lift
Without
With
+19.0%
Interview Lift
resolved cases with interview
Typical timeline
4y 6m
Avg Prosecution
15 currently pending
Career history
424
Total Applications
across all art units

Statute-Specific Performance

§101
32.0%
-8.0% vs TC avg
§103
43.6%
+3.6% vs TC avg
§102
8.1%
-31.9% vs TC avg
§112
12.9%
-27.1% vs TC avg
Black line = Tech Center average estimate • Based on career data from 403 resolved cases

Office Action

§103
DETAILED ACTION The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . Status of Claims This Office action is in reply to the communications filed on 03 March 2026. Claims 6, 13-14 and 20 have been previously canceled. Claims 1-5, 7-12 and 15-19 are currently pending and have been examined. Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114 A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 03 March 2026 has been entered. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status. The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action: A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made. The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows: 1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art. 2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue. 3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art. 4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness. Claims 1-4, 7-11, and 15-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Belton Jr. et al (US Patent #10,395,057 B1, hereinafter “Belton”) in view of Charyk et al (US Patent #9,477,737 B1, hereinafter “Charyk”) in view of Jana et al (US 2011/0137856 A1, hereinafter “Jana”). Claims 1, 8 and 15: Belton discloses a method, a universal profile management system, comprising: a processor; a computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer-readable medium; and stored instructions translatable by the processor for comprising (see FIG. 5 is an illustration of an example computer-readable medium or computer-readable device including processor-executable instructions. Fig. 1 profile management system): receiving, by a universal profile management system, a new enterprise policy (see col. 13 lines 63-col. 14 lines 1-3: the profile management system 100 may be a central system which acts as a clearing house or supports one or more platforms associated with career navigation, mentoring, sponsorship, skill gap, talent searching, etc. for a line of business or for a goal. The profile management system 100 may operate independently of other systems and facilitates translation or communication of data or information between one or more of the other systems. Col. 3 lines 33-43: For example, in a scenario where the first entity is an employee of a company and the second entity is the company, the company may not want day to day details of a project released on a profile for the employee until that project has been launched. Perhaps the company would prefer that merely the codename); responsive to receiving the new enterprise policy, creating a new rule for pushing a profile update, the rule being internal to the universal profile management system and created to enforce the new enterprise policy to single user-updateable universal profiles for public-facing individuals; storing the new rule in a rules database (see col. 7 lines 16-28: The second management component 120B may employ the interface component 110 to provide the second entity with an interface to manage the profile (e.g., the profile of the first entity or the profile created by the first entity). For example, the interface component 110 may provide a back end interface which provides content controls for screening, restricting, or controlling access to content (e.g., a drop down menu with one or more options for one or more portions of a profile, such as public, private, semi-private, etc.). This drop down menu may be provided for one or more portions of the profile to maintain privacy settings for corresponding portions of the profile); the public-facing individuals registered with the universal profile management system (see col. 4 lines 56-64: when a first entity creates a profile (e.g., utilizing management component 120), the first management component 120A may employ the interface component 110 to provide the first entity with a front end interface which guides the first entity through a profile setup process. For example, the interface component 110 may provide a front end interface which includes one or more fields for information to be filled out by the first entity.) and subject to governmental regulatory requirements on the data of public-facing individuals that is published to media platforms, the governmental regulatory requirements relating to data privacy or advertising regulations (See col. 6 lines 52-60: the system 100 may be implemented in a business setting or a business environment where the second entity, organization, or employer may not wish for one or more portions of a profile, associated content, information, data, etc. to be made public. Examples of scenarios where a second entity may not wish information to be public may include sensitive information, trade secrets, internal documents, employee evaluations, or other confidential information. Col. 7 lines 20-27: For example, the interface component 110 may provide a back end interface which provides content controls for screening, restricting, or controlling access to content (e.g., a drop down menu with one or more options for one or more portions of a profile, such as public, private, semi-private, etc.). This drop-down menu may be provided for one or more portions of the profile to maintain privacy settings for corresponding portions of the profile.); applying, by the universal profile management system, the new rule from the rules database to the maintained user-updateable universal profiles, the new enterprise policy being subject to one or more of the governmental regulatory requirements; determining, by the universal profile management system, whether any of the maintained user-updateable universal profiles violate the new rule; responsive to determining that a user-updateable universal profile of the maintained user-updateable universal profiles violates the new rule, the modifying a respective universal profile stored in a central repository for the public-facing individual, the central repository maintained by the universal profile management system, (See col. 10 lines 1-5: For example, if a first entity describes an idea (e.g., owned or to be assigned to an enterprise, corporation, business, second entity, etc.) which is undergoing the process of being submitted as a patent, the second entity may be granted access to control that portion of the content. Further, the content control component 150 may automatically hide such content from public view. In other words, a default setting for work related content may be hidden). Belton discloses providing third parties access to the profile information (col. 10 lines 9-12). Belton does not expressly disclose the following limitations but Charyk in the same field of endeavor teaches, the universal profile management system configured to maintain single user-updateable universal profiles for the public-facing individuals, each of the universal profiles being linked to multiple media accounts stored on disparate media platforms in a regulated industry, each of the media accounts having a corresponding platform-specific profile for respective public-facing individuals, and automatically pushing by the universal profile management system, a profile update to the platform-specific user profiles for the respective public-facing individual stored on the disparate media platforms, (see col. 8 lines 18-24: profile update system 100 pushes the indicated update to a plurality of remote databases of partners, such as financial institutions, governmental institutions, retail companies, and non-commerce companies, such as websites and social media applications. In other embodiments, any other entity may be included as a recipient of profile updates of the user.); accessing a mapping of universal profile metadata to platform-specific metadata of each the disparate media platforms (see col. 2 lines 60-66: first user information including a plurality of first data fields and a corresponding plurality of first data values associated with respective first data fields, wherein at least some of the plurality of remote databases include matching first data values in particular first data fields, access a first remote database of the plurality of remote databases via one or more network connections and an application programming interface in communication with the first remote database, determine first remote data associated with the first user stored in the first remote database, compare the first remote data to the first user information by comparing each of a plurality of first data values in the first user information to corresponding remote data values of associated data fields in the first remote data, identify a particular first data value that does not match a corresponding remote data value for an associated data field, ). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to include in the system and method of Belton, the universal profile management system configured to maintain single user-updateable universal profiles for the public-facing individuals, each of the universal profiles being linked to multiple media accounts stored on disparate media platforms in a regulated industry, each of the media accounts having a corresponding platform-specific profile for respective public-facing individuals and automatically pushing by the universal profile management system, a profile update to the platform-specific user profiles for the respective public-facing individual stored on the disparate media platform and accessing a mapping of universal profile metadata to platform-specific metadata of each the disparate media platform as taught by Charyk because it “makes it easier for the user to provide updated information to multiple entities” (Charyk, col. 7 lines 3-4). Belton and Charyk do not expressly disclose the following limitations but Jana in the same field of endeavor teaches, translating the universal profile metadata into platform-specific metadata specific for each application programming interface (API) call of the respective media platform, wherein each API call updates a corresponding one of the platform-specific user profiles based on API requirements associated with a corresponding one of the disparate media platforms (see [0020]: aggregating and translating real-time user information to update social network profiles in a network. [0033] The transcoder 208 translate each of the inferences made by the inference engine 206 into a format that is compatible with any of the API's used by the third party applications). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to combine Belton and Charyk with the system and method of translating the universal profile metadata into platform-specific metadata specific for each application programming interface (API) call of the respective media platform, wherein each API call updates a corresponding one of the platform-specific user profiles based on API requirements associated with a corresponding one of the disparate media platforms as taught by Jana because it would format the updates to be compatible with the API’s used by the third party applications (Jana, [0033]). Claims 2, 9 and 16: The combination of Belton, Charyk and Jana discloses the claimed invention as applied to claims 1, 8 and 15 above. Belton further discloses receiving a user-initiated profile update from the respective public-facing individual; and responsive to determining that the user-initiated the profile update violates the new rule, denying publication of the user-initiated profile update to the multiple user profiles stored on disparate media platforms (see col. 5 lines 24-33: A may facilitate profile creation by ordering the interface component 110 to render a front end interface for profile creation. The first management component 120A may enable a user or entity to engage in profile creation by allowing a user, entity, individual, profile owner, etc. to add, modify, update, delete, remove, control access to, share, or manage content, data, information, etc. associated with one or more portions of a profile. The profile may be associated with an entity, such as a first entity or a profile owner. Col. 6 lines 60-67: Here, the content control component 150 may determine one or more portions of the profile of the first entity which are associated with the second entity and grant the second entity access to manage those respective portions of the profile. Here, the second management component 120B may allow the second entity (e.g., an employer) to delete, modify, control, restrict, or otherwise manage access to content, data, or information within the profile of the first entity or employee. The second management component 120B may enable the employer to manage portions of the profile associated with the employer, such as projects, duties, day to day activities of the employee, etc.). Claims 3, 10 and 17: The combination of Belton, Charyk and Jana discloses the claimed invention as applied to claims 2, 9 and 16 above. Belton further discloses reverting each of the multiple user profiles associated with the public-facing individual to a prior state; or initiating a manual review of the user-initiated profile update to the multiple user profiles stored on the disparate media platforms (See col. 6 lines 62-67: the second management component 120B may allow the second entity (e.g., an employer) to delete, modify, control, restrict, or otherwise manage access to content, data, or information within the profile of the first entity or employee. The second management component 120B may enable the employer to manage portions of the profile associated with the employer, such as projects, duties, day to day activities of the employee, etc.). Claims 4, 11 and 18: The combination of Belton, Charyk and Jana discloses the claimed invention as applied to claims 1, 8 and 15 above. Belton further discloses wherein the universal profile stored in the central repository for the public-facing individual is not specific to any account associated with the public-facing individual on the disparate media platforms (see col. 5 lines 22-30: The management component(s) 120 may enable users or entities to manage profiles in a variety of different ways. For example, a first management component 120A may facilitate profile creation by ordering the interface component 110 to render a front-end interface for profile creation. In one or more embodiments, the first management component 120A may be accessible by merely the profile owner or a super user). Claim 7: The combination of Belton, Charyk and Jana discloses the claimed invention as applied to claim 1 above. Belton further teaches wherein the rule is created and stored internal to the universal profile management system (see col. 8 lines 32-43: a second entity, such as an employer, may have full, unfettered access to this portion of the profile due to the nature of the content within this portion of the profile. In other words, because this portion or section of the profile is work related (e.g., as determined by the content control component 150), the employer or second entity may retain or be granted one or more rights to manage this portion of the profile by the second management component 120B or the content control component 150. The content control component 150 may detect when one or more portions of a profile are relevant to a second entity based on one or more aspects, such as keywords, project names, image recognition, tags, etc.). Claims 5, 12 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Belton, Charyk and Jana as applied to claims 1, 8 and 15 and in further view of Keith et al (US 2009/0183179 A1). Claims 5, 12, and 19: The combination of Belton, Charyk and Jana discloses the claimed invention as applied to claims 1, 8 and 15 above. Belton, Charyk and Jana do not expressly disclose the following limitations but Keith teaches receiving a communication from an enterprise system, the communication indicating a change to a policy associated with the rule; responsive to the change to the policy, re-applying the rule, wherein re-application of the rule triggers a new update to the universal profile stored in the central repository for the public- facing individual (see [0042]: Periodically, each user's intelligent assistant checks for new or updated rules. [0058]: Rules interface 112 is used by rules experts 60 to define or redefine a rules attribute. [0086]: Rules executor process 121 executes the new or modified rule against its version of user primitive database 128, and when appropriate, updates user profile 127 with information resulting from executing the new or updated rule). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the profile management of Belton, Charyk and Jana with the system and method of, receiving a communication from an enterprise system, the communication indicating a change to a policy associated with the rule; responsive to the change to the policy, re-applying the rule, wherein re-application of the rule triggers a new update to the universal profile stored in the central repository for the public- facing individual as taught by Keith in order to maintain correct user profile information (Keith, P[0086]). Response to Arguments Applicant’s arguments with respect to the 35 USC 103 rejections have been considered but are moot because a new prior art reference has been applied to the claims in view of the claim amendments. Conclusion The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure: Sutton et al (US 20140129632 A1): calling the social networking platform's programmatic APIs to query the social account metadata and content on a periodic basis. When a change is detected, the process uses the data set, or a separate process that abstracts access to the data set, to determine whether or not the change is authorized. If the change is not authorized, the change event is logged and notifications are created within the system and sent via electronic communications (email, text message, instant message, message on a social account, etc.) to administrators configured within the system. The administrators have the option to approve the change or not. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MAAME BALLOU whose telephone number is (571)270-1359. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 9am-5pm. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Lynda Jasmin can be reached at 571-272-6782. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. MAAME BALLOU Examiner Art Unit 3629 /MAAME BALLOU/Examiner, Art Unit 3629 /LYNDA JASMIN/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3629
Read full office action

Prosecution Timeline

Show 25 earlier events
Feb 20, 2025
Non-Final Rejection mailed — §103
May 14, 2025
Applicant Interview (Telephonic)
May 15, 2025
Examiner Interview Summary
May 20, 2025
Response Filed
Sep 03, 2025
Final Rejection mailed — §103
Mar 03, 2026
Request for Continued Examination
Mar 19, 2026
Response after Non-Final Action
Oct 16, 2026
Non-Final Rejection mailed — §103 (current)

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Study what changed to get past this examiner. Based on 5 most recent grants.

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Prosecution Projections

10-11
Expected OA Rounds
17%
Grant Probability
36%
With Interview (+19.0%)
4y 6m (~0m remaining)
Median Time to Grant
High
PTA Risk
Based on 403 resolved cases by this examiner. Grant probability derived from career allowance rate.

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