Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Detailed Action
1. This action is responsive to communication filed on: 4 December 2025 and 11 March 2026 with acknowledgement of an original application filed on 25 October 2021 and a provisional application filed 23 October 2020.
2. Claims 1-18 are currently pending. Claims 1, 7, and 13, are independent claims. Claims 1-18 have been amended.
Response to Arguments
3. Applicant's arguments filed 4 December 2025 have been fully considered however they are moot due to new grounds of rejection necessitated by applicant’s amendments to the claims. The 112 rejections have been withdrawn due to amendment.
Claim Rejections – 35 USC § 103
4. 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 of this title, 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.
5. Claims 1, 4, 7, 10, 13, and 16, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rasanen et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0290392 (hereinafter ‘392) in view of McCann et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0200047 (hereinafter ‘047).
As to independent claim 1, “A method of inheriting a charging rule from a first user session for a second user session using a Diameter protocol, comprising:” is taught in ‘392 paragraphs 10-14 and 20-23, note the same PCRF (policy and charging rules functions) is supposed to control sessions (i.e. first and second) of a given terminal/user equipment to overcome the problem of different policy control entities find a binding for policy-controlled sessions of the user to a policy control entity on the basis of the user identification parameter;
“receiving an inherit-Charging Rules attribute value pair (AVP) for the second session, at a Policy Charging and Enforcement Function (PCEF) of a network architecture from a Policy Charging Rules Function (PCRF) of the network architecture” is shown in ‘392 paragraphs 10-14, 20-23, and 90-94
“and inheriting for the second session, by the PCEF, the charging rule from the first session based on the inherit-Charging Rules AVP, wherein the associated session is the first user session and the charging rule name references the charging rule” is taught in ‘392 paragraphs 10-14, 20-23, 71, and 90-94;the following is not explicitly taught in ‘392:
“wherein the inherit-Charging Rules AVP includes an AVP header, an associated session and at least one of a charging rule name, an exclude charging rule name, an exclude charging rule base name, or an AVP” however ‘047 teaches exchanging Diameter messages for harmonization (i.e. inheritance of session parameters) that include adding, deleting, and /or modifying message portions such as the header in the Abstract, paragraphs 34, 36-39, and 41.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention of a method and system for binding common control for sessions taught in ‘392 to include a means to utilize the header of a Diameter protocol message to exchange information for modification of parameters in the header. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to perform such a modification because there is a need form Diameter protocol harmonization see ‘047 paragraphs 16-18.
As to dependent claim 4, “The method of claim 1 wherein the inherit-Charging Rules AVP further comprises a select list of rules that includes the charging rule name” is taught in ‘047 paragraphs 39 and 64;
“and further comprising, by the PCEF, fetching the select list of rules installed for the first user session and installing them as rules for the second user session based on the inherit- Charging Rules AVP” is shown in ‘047 paragraphs 10-14, 20-23, 71, and 92-94.
As to independent claim 7, this claim is directed to a non-transitory computer-readable media containing instructions that implement the method of claim 1; therefore, it is rejected along similar rationale.
As to dependent claim 10, this claim contains substantially similar subject matter as claim 4; therefore, it is rejected along similar rationale.
As to independent claim 13, this claim is directed to a system executing the method of claim 1; therefore, it is rejected along similar rationale.
As to dependent claim 16, this claim contains substantially similar subject matter as claim 4; therefore, it is rejected along similar rationale.
6. Claims 2-3, 8-9, and 14-15, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rasanen et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0290392 (hereinafter ‘392) in view of McCann et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0200047 (hereinafter ‘047) in further view of Oh U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2012/0271958 (hereinafter ‘958).
As to dependent claim 2, the following is not explicitly taught in ‘392 and ‘047: “The method of claim 1 wherein the inherit-Charging Rules AVP is received from the PCRF in a Re-Auth-Request (RAR) Command or a Credit- Control-Answer (CCA) command of the Diameter protocol” however ‘958 teaches session establishment as well as using Re-Auth-Request (RAR) commands in paragraphs 32-33.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention of a method and system for binding common control for sessions taught in ‘392 and ‘047 to include a means to utilize Re-Auth-Request (RAR) commands. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to perform such a modification because to improve Policy & Charging Control (PCC) rule exchange for binding and changing sessions see ‘958 paragraphs 4-7.
As to dependent claim 3, “The method of claim 2 further comprising, by the PCEF, fetching a list of all rules installed for the first user session and installing them as rules for the second user session based on the inherit-Charging Rules AVP” is taught in ‘958 paragraphs 32-33 and Table 2.
As to dependent claims 8-9 and 14-15, these claims contain substantially similar subject matter as claims 2-3; therefore, they are rejected along similar rationale.
7. Claims 5-6, 11-12, and 17-18, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rasanen et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0290392 (hereinafter ‘392) in view of McCann et al. U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0200047 (hereinafter ‘047) in further view of Wang U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2016/0226765 (hereinafter ‘765).
As to dependent claim 5, the following is not explicitly taught in ‘392 and ‘047: “The method of claim 1 wherein inheriting for the second session, by the PCEF, the charging rule from the first session based on the inherit-Charging Rules AVP includes excluding, by the PCEF, inheritance from the first session of a rule referenced by the exclude charging rule name” however ‘765 teaches modifying a PCC rules in an AF session using messages in paragraphs 101-104.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention of a method and system for binding common control for sessions taught in ‘392 and ‘047 to include a means to utilize messages to exclude rules (i.e. delete rules). One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to perform such a modification because with the growth of the internet services and the PCRF policy changes improvements are needed to reduce information transmission between network resources see ‘765 paragraphs 3-6.
As to dependent claim 6, “The method of claim 1 wherein inheriting for the second session, by the PCEF, the charging rule from the first session based on the inherit-Charging Rules AVP includes excluding, by the PCEF, inheritance from the first session of a rule base referenced by the exclude charging rule base name” is taught in ‘765 paragraphs 101-104.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any extension fee pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the date of this final action.
8. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ELLEN C TRAN whose telephone number is (571) 272-3842. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday.
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, Jeff Pwu can be reached at 571-272-6798. 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.
/ELLEN TRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2433 20 July 2026
Prosecution Insights