DETAILED ACTION
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 submissions filed on 21 November 2024 and 31 March 2025 have been entered.
By the 21 November 2024 response, Claim 12 was amended and new Claims 21-23 were added. No claims were canceled. A requirement for restriction was mailed on 29 January 2025, the response to which is discussed below.
By the 31 March 2025 response, Claim 23 has been canceled and new Claim 24 has been added. No claims have been amended. Claims 1-22 and 24 are currently pending in the present application.
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election of Claims 1-22 in the reply filed on 31 March 2025 is acknowledged. Because applicant did not distinctly and specifically point out the supposed errors in the restriction requirement, the election has been treated as an election without traverse (MPEP § 818.01(a)). Applicant merely asserts that the groups “are closely related” and could be examined without an undue burden (page 8 of the present response). Applicant provides no explanation for how the groups are related or an explanation of burden or lack thereof.
Newly submitted Claim 24 is directed to an invention that is independent or distinct from the invention originally claimed for the following reasons:
Restriction to one of the following inventions is required under 35 U.S.C. 121:
Claims 1-22, drawn to methods that include determining a probability of a malicious communication session, classified in H04L 63/1416; or
Claim 24, drawn to a method that includes training synthetic data generator neural networks and a classifier model, classified in G06N 3/045.
The inventions are independent or distinct, each from the other because:
Inventions II and I are related as combination and subcombination. Inventions in this relationship are distinct if it can be shown that (1) the combination as claimed does not require the particulars of the subcombination as claimed for patentability, and (2) that the subcombination has utility by itself or in other combinations (MPEP § 806.05(c)). In the instant case, the combination as claimed does not require the particulars of the subcombination as claimed because Claim 24 only recites “using the trained classifier model to detect malicious transactions” without requiring any of the details of detecting malicious transactions as recited in the claims of Invention I (e.g. Claim 1). The subcombination has separate utility such as determining probabilities of malicious communication sessions.
The examiner has required restriction between combination and subcombination inventions. Where applicant elects a subcombination, and claims thereto are subsequently found allowable, any claim(s) depending from or otherwise requiring all the limitations of the allowable subcombination will be examined for patentability in accordance with 37 CFR 1.104. See MPEP § 821.04(a). Applicant is advised that if any claim presented in a divisional application is anticipated by, or includes all the limitations of, a claim that is allowable in the present application, such claim may be subject to provisional statutory and/or nonstatutory double patenting rejections over the claims of the instant application.
Restriction for examination purposes as indicated is proper because all the inventions listed in this action are independent or distinct for the reasons given above and there would be a serious search and/or examination burden if restriction were not required because one or more of the following reasons apply: the inventions have acquired a separate status in the art in view of their different classifications; the inventions require a different field of search (for example, searching different classes/subclasses/symbols or electronic resources, or employing different search queries); and/or the prior art applicable to one invention would not likely be applicable to another invention.
Since applicant has received an action on the merits for the originally presented invention, this invention has been constructively elected by original presentation for prosecution on the merits. Accordingly, Claim 24 is withdrawn from consideration as being directed to a non-elected invention. See 37 CFR 1.142(b) and MPEP § 821.03.
To preserve a right to petition, the reply to this action must distinctly and specifically point out supposed errors in the restriction requirement. Otherwise, the election shall be treated as a final election without traverse. Traversal must be timely. Failure to timely traverse the requirement will result in the loss of right to petition under 37 CFR 1.144. If claims are subsequently added, applicant must indicate which of the subsequently added claims are readable upon the elected invention.
Should applicant traverse on the ground that the inventions are not patentably distinct, applicant should submit evidence or identify such evidence now of record showing the inventions to be obvious variants or clearly admit on the record that this is the case. In either instance, if the examiner finds one of the inventions unpatentable over the prior art, the evidence or admission may be used in a rejection under 35 U.S.C. 103 or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) of the other invention.
Applicant is reminded that upon the cancelation of claims to a non-elected invention, the inventorship must be corrected in compliance with 37 CFR 1.48(a) if one or more of the currently named inventors is no longer an inventor of at least one claim remaining in the application. A request to correct inventorship under 37 CFR 1.48(a) must be accompanied by an application data sheet in accordance with 37 CFR 1.76 that identifies each inventor by his or her legal name and by the processing fee required under 37 CFR 1.17(i).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-20 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Specification
The abstract of the disclosure is objected to because it includes informalities. In particular, the first sentence of the abstract is a fragment. Further, the abstract includes legal phraseology of the type frequently used in patent claims (e.g. “wherein”) which is to be avoided in the abstract. A corrected abstract of the disclosure is required and must be presented on a separate sheet, apart from any other text. See MPEP § 608.01(b).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to abstract ideas without significantly more.
Independent Claim 1 recites a method that receiving session establishment data, determining a probability of whether the data indicates that a session is malicious, and determining that a transaction corresponding to the data is or is not malicious. The step of determining the probability is a mathematical calculation, which constitutes a mathematical concept. Mathematical concepts are one of the groupings of abstract ideas set forth in MPEP § 2106.04(I). The steps of determining whether the transaction is or is not malicious only requires comparing the probability to a threshold, which constitutes a mental process. Mental processes are also one of the groupings of abstract ideas set forth in MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2). Abstract ideas are judicial exceptions as per MPEP § 2106.04(I). See also Alice Corporation Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank, International, et al, 573 U.S. 208, 110 USPQ2d 1976 (2014).
The judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because there is no clear use or further action with respect to the determinations. Nothing concrete is done with the result of the determinations. The step of receiving the data constitutes mere data gathering, which amounts to insignificant extra-solution activity as per MPEP § 2106.05(g). There is nothing in the claim that would result in a particular transformation, as per MPEP § 2106.05(c), nor does the claim require the use of the abstract idea in conjunction with a particular machine or manufacture, as per MPEP § 2106.05(b). The recitations of the steps being performed by a malicious transaction detection system constitutes nothing more than mere instructions to implement the abstract idea on a computer or a limitation to a particular technological environment, as per MPEP § 2106.05(f) and (h). Although the claim recites a “determination model”, this is only recited in generic terms and is not linked to the performance of any particular method step, and therefore constitutes at most a limitation to a particular technological environment. There are no additional elements that apply or use the abstract idea in a meaningful way beyond merely linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment. There is no further step taken beyond comparing the calculated probabilities to a threshold that would result in a practical application of the abstract ideas. Therefore, the claim is not directed to a practical application of the abstract idea.
The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for similar reasons as detailed above with respect to the question of a practical application of the judicial exception. The step of receiving the communications session establishment data is claimed at a high level of generality and is generally directed to receiving data over a network or retrieving data from memory. These have been recognized by the courts as well-understood, routine, and conventional functions. See MPEP § 2106.05(d)(II), citing Symantec, TLI, OIP Techs, buySAFE, and Versata. Therefore, the claim as a whole, whether the functions are considered individually or as an ordered combination, is not directed to significantly more than the abstract idea.
Similarly, independent Claim 13 is directed to a system having functionality corresponding to the method of Claim 1, and recites abstract ideas for similar reasons. The recitations of the processor and memory are at a generic level and constitute nothing more than mere instructions to implement the abstract ideas on a computer. See MPEP § 2106.05(f). Therefore, the system claim is also not directed to significantly more than the abstract ideas.
Independent Claim 20 is directed to a computer-readable medium storing instructions for performing steps corresponding to the method of Claim 1, and recites abstract ideas for similar reasons. The recitation of the computer-readable medium constitutes nothing more than a mere instruction to implement the abstract ideas on a computer. See MPEP § 2106.05(f). Therefore, the software claim is also not directed to significantly more than the abstract ideas.
Dependent Claims 2-12, 14-19, 21, and 22 only recite further details of the abstract idea, additional abstract steps such as generating synthetic data, or additional insignificant extra-solution steps. These claims recite abstract ideas for the same reasons as the independent claim, and also are not directed to a practical application and do not add significantly more to the abstract ideas recited in the independent claims.
Based upon consideration of all of the relevant factors with respect to the claims as an ordered combination and as a whole, Claims 1-22 are determined to be directed to abstract ideas without a practical application and without significantly more, as detailed above. Therefore, based on the above analysis, the claimed inventions are not directed to patent eligible subject matter.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 1 recites “the communications session” in lines 6-7. There is not clear antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. The claim further recites steps of determining conditioned on whether or not a probability is greater than or less than a threshold value in lines 8-13, but does not recite a step of comparing the determined probability and the threshold, which appears to be a gap in the claim. The claim additionally recites that “the malicious transaction detection system includes a determination model” in lines 14-15. However, it is not clear how this limits the claimed method because the determination model is not used in any of the method steps. The above ambiguities render the claim indefinite.
Claim 2 recites that “the determination model is built, generated, or created”. It is not clear whether these are intended to be steps of the claimed method.
Claim 3 recites that “the synthetic communications session data is generated” in line 2 and “one or more of the plurality of synthetic data generator neural networks is trained” in lines 4-5. It is not clear whether the generating or training are intended to be steps of the claimed method.
Claim 4 recites “is trained using actual proprietary or confidential customer data includes at least two synthetic data generator neural networks” in lines 3-4. It is not clear what the subject of “includes” is intended to be or how this phrase is grammatically related to the rest of the claim.
Claim 5 recites that “one or more of the plurality of synthetic data generator neural networks are built, created, or generated” in lines 2-3 and “said adversarial training process is implemented” in line 4. It is not clear whether these are intended to be steps of the claimed method.
Claim 7 recites “one or more of the plurality of synthetic data generator neural networks is trained” in lines 2-3. It is not clear whether the training is intended to be a step of the claimed method.
Claim 8 recites “each of the synthetic data generator neural networks… are relocated” in lines 1-2. It is not clear whether the relocating is intended to be a step of the claimed method.
Claim 12 recites “the first synthetic data generator neural network is an autoencoder neural network:” in lines 2-3. It appears that the colon may be intended to be a semicolon.
Claim 13 recites “the communications session” in lines 7-8. There is not clear antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. The claim further recites operations of determining conditioned on whether or not a probability is greater than or less than a threshold value in lines 10-16, but does not recite comparing the determined probability and the threshold, which appears to be a gap in the claim. The claim additionally recites that “classify communications session establishment data as good or bad” in lines 19-20. The terms “good” and “bad” are relative or subjective terms which have not been clearly defined in the claims or specification. See MPEP § 2173.05(b). The above ambiguities render the claim indefinite.
Claim 15 recites that “the synthetic communications session data is generated” in line 3 and “one or more of the plurality of synthetic data generator neural networks is trained” in lines 5-6. The timing of these operations relative to the operations recited in Claim 13 is not clear.
Claim 16 recites that “one or more of the plurality of synthetic data generator neural networks are built, created, or generated” in lines 2-3 and “said adversarial training process is implemented” in line 4. The timing of these operations relative to the operations recited in Claim 13 is not clear.
Claim 18 recites “one or more of the plurality of synthetic data generator neural networks is trained” in lines 2-3. The timing of this training relative to the operations recited in Claim 13 is not clear. Additionally, it is not clear whether the recitations of Claim 18 related to the customer’s premises provide a clear limitation on the system of Claim 13.
Claim 20 recites “the communications session” in line 7. There is not clear antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. The claim further recites operations of determining conditioned on whether or not a probability is greater than or less than a threshold value in lines 8-13, but does not recite comparing the determined probability and the threshold, which appears to be a gap in the claim. Further, the recitations of “determine” in lines 9 and 12 are not in clear parallel structure with the previous steps of “receiving” and “determining”, and the subject of the verb “determine” is not clear in context. The claim additionally recites that “the malicious transaction detection system includes a determination model” in lines 14-15. However, it is not clear how this limits the claimed medium because the determination model does not appear to be a component of the claimed medium. The above ambiguities render the claim indefinite.
Claims not explicitly referred to above are rejected due to their dependence on a rejected base claim.
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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.
Claims 1-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Scherman et al, US Patent 10699009, in view of Yu et al, US Patent Application Publication 2021/0334644.
In reference to Claim 1, Scherman discloses a method that includes operating a malicious transaction data system to receive communications session establishment data (see column 3, line 53-column 4, line 24); determine a probability of whether the data indicates that a session is malicious (column 3, lines 32-36; column 5, lines 10-16); and if the probability is greater than a predetermined threshold, determine that a transaction is malicious and if the probability is less than the threshold, determine that the transaction is not malicious (column 3, lines 36-45; column 5, lines 16-28). However, although Scherman further discloses a trained determination model (for example, see column 1, lines 27-40; column 4, line 8-24), Scherman does not explicitly disclose that the model is trained using synthetic communications data.
Yu discloses a method that includes training a model using synthetic data (see paragraphs 0057-0068). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the method of Scherman to include the training using synthetic data as taught by Yu, because synthetic training data is easier to generate (see Yu, paragraph 0059).
In reference to Claim 2, Scherman and Yu further disclose artificial intelligence machine learning (Scherman, column 1, lines 27-40; column 4, line 8-24; Yu, paragraphs 0057-0068, for example).
In reference to Claims 3-9 and 21, Scherman and Yu further disclose a plurality of synthetic data generator neural networks (Scherman, column 1, lines 27-40; column 4, line 8-24; Yu, paragraphs 0057-0068, for example) trained using customer data at customer premises (Yu, paragraphs 0561-0562), using an adversarial training process such as a generative adversarial network (Yu, paragraph 0082; see also paragraph 0521) or a variational autoencoder network (Yu, paragraph 0521).
In reference to Claims 10-12 and 22, Scherman and Yu similarly disclose using a plurality of synthetic data generator neural networks trained using customer data (Scherman, column 1, lines 27-40; column 4, line 8-24; Yu, paragraphs 0057-0068 and 0561-0567), where a network is an autoencoder neural network (Yu, paragraph 0521) and training includes generating a training set of labeled feature vectors and inputting a first portion of the training set to output a set of synthetic data feature vectors (Yu, paragraphs 0066-0076); combining the synthetic feature vectors with a second portion of the training set to determine whether each vector is a synthetic vector (Yu, paragraphs 0066-0076); and adjusting the weights (Yu, paragraph 0104, for example).
Claims 13-19 are directed to systems having functionality corresponding substantially to the methods of Claims 1-3, 5-7, and 10, and are rejected by a similar rationale, mutatis mutandis.
Claim 20 is directed to a software implementation of the method of Claim 1, and is rejected by a similar rationale.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Garg, US Patent 10404852, discloses a system that determines a likelihood a session is a nuisance communication.
Lin et al, US Patent 11178168, discloses a system that calculates a likelihood of events belonging to a malicious session.
Sankaranarayanan, US Patent 11687568, discloses a system that generates synthetic datasets using generative adversarial networks and variational autoencoders.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Zachary A Davis whose telephone number is (571)272-3870. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday, 9:00am-5:30pm, Eastern Time.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone 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, Rupal D Dharia can be reached at (571) 272-3880. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Zachary A. Davis/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2492