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
The communication received on 12/03/25 has been entered.
The Terminal disclaimer has been accepted and the Double Panting rejection withdrawn.
Response to Arguments/Amendments
Applicant's arguments have been carefully considered but they were not found persuasive.
Applicant essentially argues two issues:
The limitation “wherein the guardian security node is configured to generate a token associated with a transaction, and the gatekeeper security node is configured to receive the token from the guardian node.
Official Notices taken by the examiner.
To support the alleged lack of teaching, applicant recite fragments of the specification: "[t]he token is a single use data object that includes a unique number, an identifier of the issuing Gatekeeper Node 30 and a session identifier that prevents replay attacks" and, suggest that in light of the specification email should not be interpreted as the claimed token.
For the purpose of the prosecution, an examiner is responsible for the broadest reasonable interpretation of the claims. Although the claims are interpreted in light of the specification, limitations from the specification are not read into the claims. See In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 26 USPQ2d 1057 (Fed. Cir. 1993).
Recitation of the “token” in para 52, with which Applicant appears to limit the interpretation of the claim language, does not define the term “token” but merely refer to the token discussed within the context of interaction between parties illustrated in Fig. 3.
Moreover, tokens may have various interpretation. While the term “token” is commonly associated with coins, a skilled in the art of computing would readily recognize that tokens are simply data structure(s) containing data. As such, email or some parts of it could reasonably be interpreted broadly as token(s).
Even if one was to argue that a data structure should include an identifier (as also argued by applicant), clearly email include variety of identifiers, at the very least, a sender and recipient information/addresses.
As per Official Notices, applicant states that Official Notice is permissible only for certain types of facts; those that are capable of instant and unquestionable demonstration as being well-known. Examples of such facts include those that are of common knowledge in the art. (MPEP § 2144.03(A)). The Office must provide specific factual findings predicated on sound technical and scientific reasoning to support taking Official Notice. (MPEP §2144.03(B)). It is never appropriate to rely solely on Official Notice as the principal evidence upon which a rejection was based. Instead, Official Notice is only appropriate for facts that are of "notorious character" and that serve to "fill in the gaps" that might exist in the evidentiary showing to support a particular ground of rejection. (MPEP § 2144.03(A)).
However, applicant fails to adequately support the allegation. While choosing selectively MPEP citations (MPEP 2144.03 (B)) applicant overlooks applicant’s responsibility in regard to the Official Notice that follows (see MPEP 2144.03 (C)) applicant’s cited MPEP fragments.
Applicant is reminded that to adequately traverse such a finding, an applicant must specifically point out the supposed errors in the examiner’s action, which would include stating why the noticed fact is not considered to be common knowledge or well-known in the art. See 37 CFR 1.111(b). See also Chevenard, 139 F.2d at 713, 60 USPQ at 241 (“[I]n the absence of any demand by appellant for the examiner to produce authority for his statement, we will not consider this contention.”).
As clearly cited in MPEP 2144.03 (C), a general allegation that the claims define a patentable invention without any reference to the examiner’s assertion of official notice would be inadequate and in case of applicant’s failure to traverse the examiner’s assertion of official notice or offer inadequate traversal, the common knowledge or well-known in the art statement is taken to be admitted prior art.
Claims 1-37 are pending.
The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102 or 103
Claim(s) 1-5, 7-8 and 9-11, 26-31, 33-35 and 37 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102 (a)(1) remain anticipated by or, in alternative under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kang (USPUB 20020120689).
As per claims 1, as illustrated in Fig. 1-3 and described in the associated text, Kang (USPUB 20020120689) teaches a secure communication system (Internet based email system) comprising: a network of guardian security nodes and gatekeeper security nodes configured to securely and directly communicate with one another (senders and recipients email serving systems 204/304 and 206/306); (a) wherein a guardian security node is associated with a customer (email clients 200/300 offering email services to users); ; wherein the gatekeeper security node is configured to receive the token from the guardian node (receive the processed email from the sender’s email server); wherein the gatekeeper security node is configured to associate the token received from the guardian node with a service provider account associated with the customer; and wherein the gatekeeper security node is configured to directly transmit service provider account information to the service provider (the email data including sender/recipient’s information is forwarded by the recipient’s email server system to the recipient’s client device).
Although, Kang does not expressly teach a plurality of guardian and gatekeeper security nodes, a skilled in the art would readily appreciate that Internet based system employs plurality of sender and recipient email servers. Kang also does not expressly teach the guardian security node being configured to maintain and store a registered customer account and the gatekeeper security node being configured to maintain and store a registered service provider account. However, in light of Kang entertaining to utilize the Internet based system such as Hotmail, Yahoo, etc. (e.g., para 38), the limitation if not inherent, would have been at least implicit. Clearly, at the very least users utilizing client must be authorized/login to these systems in order to use them. Moreover, [Official Notice is taken] that many of the modern email systems (including Yahoo) offer contact list information for and associated with the particular system users, while offering the benefit of usability.
As per claim 2-5, 7-8 and 11, a skilled in the art would readily appreciate that in order to be a user of the above cited system a user must first register with the system. Furthermore, in order to distinguish users (or any element in a computing system) a user must be assign a unique identifier, e.g. username (for accessing the account), while computers operate utilizing numbers. Similarly, as per claims 5, a skilled in the art would appreciate that user’s email address includes a domain of a user’s gatekeeper security node (sender’s email server system).
As per claims 9-10, clearly in order to serve customers the gatekeeper security node disclosed by Kang must detect customers (by identifying accounts), and while to expressly taught by Kang, Official Notices is taken that customers having multiple accounts would have been old and well known in the art of networking (email in particular; whether considering an email or IP address, or profile) at the time the application was filed offering the predictable benefit of usability and customization. In case of a user having multiple email/IP addresses clearly the server would have to select a correct account to forward the data correctly.
The limitation of claims 26-31, 33-35 and 37 are substantially similar to the above addressed claims and, as a result, they are similarly rejected.
Claim(s) 6, 20, 32 remain rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kang (USPUB 20020120689) in view of Yin (USPUB 20130152221) or, in the alternative, Li (USPUB 20160134751), and in view of Braun (USPUB 20060159269, pertaining to claim 15, on which claim 20 dependents, see the rejection below).
Kang teaches two entities (gatekeeper and service provider) as discussed above.
Kang does not teach the concept of the first entity verifying the identity and registering the second entity. However, such concept would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the application was filed as illustrated by Yin (para 68) or in alternative Li (para 50) while offering the benefit of security.
Claim(s) 12-19, 21-25 and 36 remain rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kang (USPUB 20020120689) in view of Braun (USPUB 20060159269)
As per claims 12, 15-19 and 21-25, Kang’s invention is clearly directed towards various guardian and gatekeeper nodes communicating over network and a skilled in the art would readily appreciate that network communication routinely utilize cryptography for security, integrity and non-repudiation. Kang is silent regarding communication utilizing cryptography such as public/private key implementation and, in particular, an executive node communicating public keys corresponding to private keys.
However, Braun suggests such solution (see para 47). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the application was filed to include Braun’s teaching into Kang’s invention given the benefit of offering network security.
As per the table including network addresses of entities (guardian/gatekeeper nodes as required by claims 13-14 and 36) it is noted that given the fact that the addresses as cited in the claim are not involved in any particular operation, they are treated as nonfunctional material, not affecting the patentability of the invention. As such, the examiner asserts that having any particular additional elements in the table (including addresses) would have been merely a design choice offering the predictable benefit of customization.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Peter Poltorak whose telephone number is (571) 272-3840. The examiner can normally be reached Monday through Thursday from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jeffrey Pwu can be reached on (571) 272-6798. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571) 273-8300.
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/PIOTR POLTORAK/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2433