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 .
The following is a Non-Final Office Action in response to communications received on April 25, 2023 and November 5, 2025. Claims 1-14 are pending and addressed below. Claim 15 is withdrawn from consideration.
Specification
For the record, Examiner acknowledges that the Specification submitted on April 25, 2023 has been accepted.
Drawings
For the record, Examiner acknowledges that the Drawings submitted on April 25, 2023 have been accepted.
Response to Restriction Requirement
Applicant has elected species I without traverse. Therefore, claims 1-14 are pending.
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 8-14 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 8 recites the limitation “the internal shares.” There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation. Dependent claims 9-14 are rejected for containing the same indefinite language as claim 8 without further remedying the indefinite language.
Claim 9 recites the limitation “the secret S.” There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation. Dependent claim 10 is rejected for containing the same indefinite language as claim 9 without further remedying the indefinite language.
Claim 13 recites the limitation “the internal share.” The claims only previously recite multiple internal shares and not a single internal share. Therefore, there is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation.
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 1-14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception (i.e. a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea) without significantly more.
The limitations “an operation of creating, when at least one second compartment is related toward a first compartment in one direction, an encrypted secret value by using an external share which does not belong to the first compartment, but belongs to the at least one second compartment; an operation of creating a first polynomial for defining the first compartment by using the encrypted secret value; and an operation of creating an internal share of the first compartment by using the first polynomial", as drafted in claim 1 (similar rational applies to other independent claim 8 as claim 8 is the inverse of claim 1) under its broadest reasonable interpretation is the claimed concept of “Mathematical Concepts”. Accordingly, the claim recites an abstract idea.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particular, the additional elements recited in the independent claims is nothing more than insignificant extra-solution activities (i.e. a pre-solution activity and a post-solution activity. See MPEP 2106.05 (g) and Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 4 (2019-01-07); MPEP 2106.05(f)).
Therefore, claims 1-14 are directed to non-statutory subject matter. The dependent claims fail to obviate such rejections and are themselves rejected under this title for they are also abstract ideas and fall outside the plainly expressed scope of this title.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-7 are allowed.
Claims 8-14 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action.
The following is a statement on reasons for allowability over the prior art:
Claim 1 recites, inter alia, “an operation of creating, when at least one second compartment is related toward a first compartment in one direction, an encrypted secret value by using an external share which does not belong to the first compartment, but belongs to the at least one second compartment; an operation of creating a first polynomial for defining the first compartment by using the encrypted secret value”.
The closest prior art made of record are:
Ghodosi et al. (“Secret Sharing in Multilevel and Compartmented Groups” cited in the IDS filed on 2/15/2024) which discloses hierarchical threshold secret sharing (section 5)
Cho et al. (U.S. Pub. No. 2024/0323002) which discloses multilevel secret sharing (Fig. 6 and Abstract)
Dolev et al. (U.S. Pub. No. 2019/0306131) which discloses hierarchical secret sharing (paragraph [0074])
While the prior art does generally disclose hierarchical threshold secret sharing, the prior art was not found to disclose the encrypting sing the external share and the subsequent polynomial generation. Therefore, claim 1 is considered to recite allowable subject matter over the prior art. Claim 8 is the inverse process of claim 1 and is therefore, considered to recite allowable subject matter over the prior art for similar reasons to claim 1. Dependent claims 2-7 and 9-14 are considered to recite allowable subject matter over the prior art based on their dependency.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Schneider (U.S. Patent No. 8,345,861) – cited for disclosing generating a polynomial – Fig. 4
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to THADDEUS J PLECHA whose telephone number is (571)270-7506. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8-4:30.
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/THADDEUS J PLECHA/Examiner, Art Unit 2438