DETAILED ACTION
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 .
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.
This office action is in response to the communication filed on 02/05/2026.
Claims 1-5, 9-13, 16, 21-29 are pending.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments have been considered but found moot in view of new ground(s) of rejection.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
Claim(s) 1, 10, 21 is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over O’Malley et al. (GB 2,410,402 A, “O’Malley”) in view of Chang et al. (US 2012/0272289, “Chang”).
For claim 1, O’Malley discloses a system comprising:
a microprocessor; and a computer readable medium, coupled with the microprocessor and comprising microprocessor readable and executable instructions that, when executed by the microprocessor (claim 31), cause the microprocessor to:
receive a request to authenticate from a requesting device, wherein the request to authenticate has an associated address transmitted with authentication credentials in the request to authenticate, validate the request to authenticate (fig. 1, p. 14, l. 25-30, a user will pass back a username and password, or other authentication information, to Service Manager 107. On receipt of the information, the Service Manager 107 records the source IP address of the transaction. If the username is found and the password matches, or authentication is confirmed, the Service Manager 107 creates a new entry in a Sessions table. Otherwise, the login is rejected);
in response to validating the request to authenticate, send a first message to a routing device that identifies the associated address as authenticated for routing packets (col. 15, last par., service manager sends a control command to firewall to open a hole in the firewall for the user’s source IP address for traffic);
detect that a user has logged out; in response to detecting that the user has logged out, send a second message to the routing device that identifies the associated address as invalid for routing the packets (p. 18, last par., when a user logs out, the service manager commands the firewall to close all holes opened for the user’s source IP address, and terminating any remaining connections);
O’Malley does not disclose instructions to monitor a network for use of one or more non-approved addresses; identify use of the one or more non-approved addresses on the network; and in response to identifying the use of the one or more non-approved addresses, take an action such as automatically bring up a graphical user interface, shutdown the network device, shutdown an application, quarantine the application, quarantine a device, initiate a virus scan, open up a network management system or display statistics associated with the associated address.
Chang discloses instructions to monitor a network for use of one or more non-approved addresses; identify use of the one or more non-approved addresses on the network; and in response to identifying the use of the one or more non-approved addresses, take an action such as automatically bring up a graphical user interface, shutdown the network device, shutdown an application, quarantine the application, quarantine a device, initiate a virus scan, open up a network management system or display statistics associated with the associated address ([0255], detecting a use of a blocked source address and generate a user alert via a user interface)
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply Chang’s teachings of rules-based security actions when detecting a blocked source address to O’Malley-’s system in order implement a plurality of security measures for O’Malley’s system (Chang, [0255]).
Claim 10 is/are rejected for the same rationale in claim 1 for reciting a method comprising the steps in claim 1.
Claim 21 recites a non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions that, when read by a microprocessor, cause the microprocessor to perform: the steps in claim 1 and is/are rejected for the same rationale in claim 1 (XX, claim 31).
Claim(s) 2-4, 11, 12, 22-24 is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over O’Malley-Chang in view of Droms et al. (US 7,143,435, “Droms”).
For claims 2, 11, 22, O’Malley-Chang does not disclose the request to authenticate is based on a plurality of authentication levels associated with the user, wherein a first authentication level of the plurality of authentication levels causes the first message to be sent to the routing device within a private network, and wherein a second authentication level of the plurality of authentication levels causes the first message to be sent to the routing device within the private network and to a firewall connected to an external network.
Droms discloses the request to authenticate is based on a plurality of authentication levels associated with the user, wherein a first authentication level of the plurality of authentication levels causes the first message to be sent to the routing device within a private network (fig. 1, col. 8, l. 8-37, sending authorization information with a user class with a first privilege (LAN access) to the switch to enable LAN access), and wherein a second authentication level of the plurality of authentication levels causes the first message to be sent to the routing device within the private network (fig. 1, col. 8, l. 8-37, sending authorization information with a user class with a second privilege (LAN access and Internet access) to the switch to enable LAN access) and to a firewall connected to an external network (fig. 1, col. 8, l. 8-37, col. 16, last par., sending authorization information with a user class with a second privilege (LAN access and Internet access) to the switch 102 to enable LAN access, and a message to the gateway 142 to enable Internet access).
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply Droms’s teachings of authentication levels to O’Malley-Chang’s system in order to implement a granular network access scheme based on the authentication levels.
For claims 3, 12, 23, O’Malley-Chang does not disclose the associated address is an Internet Protocol (IP) address as provided by a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol.
Droms discloses the associated address is an Internet Protocol (IP) address as provided by a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) server (col. 16, last 3 paragraphs).
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply Droms’s teachings of address configuration using DHCP to O’Malley-Chang’s system in order to automatically provision an IP address to a client device (or the requesting device) as a known benefit of DHCP.
For claims 4, 24, O’Malley-Chang does not disclose the IP address is not provided until the user logs in locally to the requesting device.
Droms discloses the IP address is not provided until the user logs in locally to the requesting device (fig. 4, col. 9, l. 46-67, user logs in with username/password to a device to be authenticated a RADIUS server, before DHCP provisioning the IP address).
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply Droms’s teachings of address configuration using DHCP to O’Malley-Chang’s system in order to automatically provision an IP address to a client device (or the requesting device) as a known benefit of DHCP.
Claim(s) 5, 13, 25 is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over O’Malley-Chang in view of Khandani (US 2020/0366468).
For claims 5, 13, 25, O’Malley-Chang does not disclose the associated address comprises at least one of: an Internet Packet Exchange (IPX) address, a Media Access Control (MAC) address, a transport layer application address, a presentation layer address, an application layer address, a port number of an application, a Q.931 address, a Uniform Resource Locator (URL), a H.323 address, and a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) address.
Khandani discloses the associated address comprises at least one of: an Internet Packet Exchange (IPX) address, a Media Access Control (MAC) address, a transport layer application address, a presentation layer address, an application layer address, a port number of an application, a Q.931 address, a Uniform Resource Locator (URL), a H.323 address, and a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) address ([0130], request for authentication including a MAC address from a client device).
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply Khandani’s teachings of MAC address authentication to O’Malley-Chang’s system in order to implement an alternative authentication of MAC address instead of IP address.
Claim(s) 9, 16, 26 is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over O’Malley-Chang in view of Grothendieck et al. (US 2019/0327252, “Grothendieck”).
For claims 9, 16, 26, O’Malley-Chang discloses the request to authenticate is for the user (O’Malley, p. 14, l. 25-30, a user will pass back a username and password, or other authentication information, to Service Manager)
O’Malley-Chang does not disclose the microprocessor readable and executable instructions further cause the microprocessor to: identify a usage pattern of authenticated addresses by the user using machine learning; identify a change to the usage pattern as an anomalous behavior; and in response to identifying the usage pattern as an anomalous behavior, take an action.
Grothendieck discloses instructions to identify a usage pattern of authenticated addresses by the user using machine learning; identify a change to the usage pattern as an anomalous behavior; and in response to identifying the usage pattern as an anomalous behavior, take an action ([0042], [0043], using machine learning to detect discordant activities (a change in usage pattern) associated with a source IP address, which is allowed or authenticated to communicate over a specified time; detected discordant activities will activate an action such as an alert).
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply Grothendieck’s teachings of machine learning for identifying discordant behavior to O’Malley-Chang’s system in order to improve the system by automatically detecting unusual or harmful activities by machine learning (Grothendieck, [0019]).
Claim(s) 27-29 is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over O’Malley-Chang in view of Seine et al. (US 2017/0180305, “Seine”).
For claims 27-29, O’Malley discloses the associated address comprises an assigned Internet Protocol (IP) address originating from the request to authenticate and supplied by a requesting device (p. 14, l. 25-30, a user will pass back a username and password, or other authentication information, to Service Manager 107. On receipt of the information, the Service Manager 107 records the source IP address of the transaction. If the username is found and the password matches, or authentication is confirmed, the Service Manager 107 creates a new entry in a Sessions table. Otherwise, the login is rejected)
O’Malley-Chang does not disclose the IP address is a static IP address.
Seine discloses a static IP address ([0013], [0039], [0040], [0049]).
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply Seine’s teachings of static IP address to O’Malley-Chang’s system in order to implement an alternative of O’Malley’s auto-configured IP addresses as static IP addresses (Seine, ([0013], [0039], [0040], [0049]).
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 nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) 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 mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to HIEU T HOANG whose telephone number is (571) 270-1253. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri 9 AM -5 PM.
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, Vivek Srivastava can be reached on 571-272-7304. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/HIEU T HOANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2449
