DETAILED ACTION
Office Action Summary
Claims 1-20 are pending in the instant application.
Claims 1-13 are rejected under 35 USC § XXX.
Claims 14-20 are withdrawn.
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.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Yoson Shimatani (US Pre-Grant Publication No: 2012/0011352 ) hereinafter referred to as Shimatani.
As per claims 1, 7 and 8, Shimatani teaches … performing a firmware update on a hardware component of a computer system; (Shimatani, figure 4 and [0088] and [0089], teaches updating and firmware versions)
collecting a hash value associated with the update of the firmware; (Shimatani, [0105] and figure 4)
adding the hash value to Platform Control Registers (PCRs) of multiple Trusted Platform Module (TPMs) of the computer system; (Shimatani, [0105])
logging the hash value in a log file; (Shimatani, [0040], teaches storing the hash values)
at a predetermined time, receiving PCR values from the TPMs; (Shimatani, figure 13, A60)
comparing the PCR values to determine whether all PCR values match; and (Shimatani, figure 13, A70)
in response to one of the PCR values not matching, issuing a warning. (Shimatani, figure 13, A100)
As per claims 2 and 9, Shimatani teaches … wherein each TPM is implicitly trusted. (Shimatani, [0003])
As per claims 3 and 10, Shimatani teaches … wherein the TPMs are synchronized using a broker service. (Shimatani, [0088] and figure 13)
As per claims 4 and 11, Shimatani teaches … detecting installation of a new hardware component having a TPM; and synchronizing a PCR value of the TPM of the new hardware component with the PCR values of the TPMs already in the system using the log file. (Shimatani, figure 8)
As per claims 5 and 12, Shimatani teaches … receiving PCR values from the TPMs including the TPM of the new hardware component; comparing the PCR value of the TPM of the new hardware component to one of the other PCR values to determine whether the PCR values match; and in response to the PCR value of the TPM of the new hardware component not matching the other PCR value, issuing a second warning. (Shimatani, figures 8 and 13)
As per claims 6 and 13, Shimatani teaches … wherein the log file is externally managed; and comprising: at a second predetermined time, validating the log file using a PCR value from at least one of the TPMs. (Shimatani, [0148])
Other Art of Record
Xiao et al. (US 20100077454 A1) teaches [0084] (1.3) TPMs of the access requestor and the access controller hash information required by a network policy and then store the hashed information into the PCRs.
Schmist el al. (US 20130198838 A1) teaches ([0197] In the network, such a tree may be pre-constructed and populated with the derived hash values by a certified authority based on the manufacturing time setup of the device or after an authenticated, authorized and integrity verifiable software/firmware update and stored securely for reference. In the device, each time the device boots securely, this tree may be reconstructed using the PDF of attack frequency by applying the optimal code tree algorithm (such as Huffman's code, arithmetic code) if it is not pre-constructed and stored and the nodes and the root are populated with the evaluated hash values (or extended PCR values). AND [0220] Secure operations with tree-formed, protected verification data registers are described below. Functionality is conceptually added to Trusted Platform Modules (TPMs) to handle Platform Configuration Registers (PCRs) which represent roots of hash trees protecting the integrity of tree-formed Stored Measurement Logs (SMLs). This enables verification and update of an inner-node of an SML and even attestation to its value with the same security level as for ordinary PCRs. As an important application, it is shown how certification of SML subtrees enables attestation of platform properties.)
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SIMON P KANAAN whose telephone number is (571)270-3906. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F (7AM-4PM).
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/SIMON P KANAAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2407
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