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
This action is responsive to amendment filed February 17, 2026.
Status of Claims
Applicant amended the claims, canceled claims 11,17, and added new claims 27-28 on 2/17/26. Claims 9,10,12-16,18-28 remain pending.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, filed 10/1/25, have been fully considered and are persuasive only for newly added claims 27-28.
On pages 8-9 of remarks, Applicant argues that claim 25 is fully supported by the disclosure.
In reply, Applicant has cited portions of the specification which are different than the limitations of claim 25. The specification neither mentions “relationship…” nor mentions “outside of a TOR network…”. Accordingly, the rejection of claim 25 under 112(a) remains, and the objection to the specification for new matter remains.
On pages 9-10 of remarks, Applicant argues that claim 9 lines 5-9 are definite.
In reply, although Applicants argument is persuasive, upon further analysis of the limitation, which was introduced in the amendment dated 10/1/25, it is determined that there is no previous disclosure which provides adequate support for it. It is therefore considered as new matter.
On page 11 of remarks, Applicant argues that claim 26 was not properly rejected because the limitation “property” is not a slight variation of the previously rejected claims.
In reply, Applicant is reminded that the claims are given their broadest reasonable interpretation. In this case, the term “property” is a generic term that has not been given sufficient functional and contextual detail to make it distinguishable from the generic term “information” found in claim 1. Accordingly, claim 26 is seen as a slight variation of claim 1.
On pages 11-12 of remarks, Applicant argues that the combination does not teach “receiving a request for information, other than…”.
In reply, Firstly, it is unclear which content is being referred to since the claim mentions different content such as crawled content and sanitized content. Secondly, Lai teaches requesting information related to the message as opposed to a direct request for the actual message. Thirdly, the claim uses the broad word “related” and does not mention anything about the argues “providing information about the source (eg. onion server) of the content”. 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).
On pages 12-13 of remarks, Applicant argues that the references do not teach the content unique identifiers.
In reply, Firstly, Applicants user of the term “unique” is broad and fails to give functional or contextual details to make it distinguishable from the applied references. The claims fail to mention the type and scope of uniqueness. Secondly, Applicant has misunderstood the rejection and how the Lai prior art is applied. The message is the source, not the link. Whereas the link is the content and which corresponds to the unique identifier.
On pages 13-14 of remarks, Applicant argues the references do not teach requests relating to the service.
In reply, the claims are broadly worded and fail to make a proper distinction between relating to the service and relating to the content, especially that the content is inherently related to the service by virtue of the apparent meaning of the claim. Accordingly the information related to the content is also related to the service, and vice versa.
On pages 14-15 of remarks, Applicant argues that the references do not teach sanitizing the content before storing the sanitized content in a local database.
In reply, Since Lai does not explicitly store in a database, the Rubin reference was introduced to show that the content is processed before storing in a database. Rubin was relied upon to teach hashing/processing the content portion of the claim, while Lai was relied upon to teach the sanitizing portion of the claim.
Regarding new claims 27-28, For claim 27 a new grounds of rejection is made under 103 based on Lai in view of Bernaschi in further view of Rubin. And for claim 28 a new grounds of rejection is made under 103 based on Lai in view of Bernaschi in further view of Rubin in further view of Suh.
Specification
The previous amendment filed 10/1/25 remains objected to under 35 U.S.C. 132(a) because it introduces new matter into the disclosure. 35 U.S.C. 132(a) states that no amendment shall introduce new matter into the disclosure of the invention. The added material which is not supported by the original disclosure is:
claim 1 line 5, which recites:
sanitizing, before storing the content in a locally controlled database
newly added claim 25, which recites:
identifying a relationship between a particular onion service of the plurality of onion services and a known-malicious webpage hosted outside of a TOR network in which the plurality of onion services are included.
Applicant is required to cancel the new matter in the reply to this Office Action.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112(a):
(a) IN GENERAL.—The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor or joint inventor of carrying out the invention.
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112:
The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention.
Claims 9,25 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph, as failing to comply with the written description requirement. This claim contains subject matter which was not described in the specification in such a way as to reasonably convey to one skilled in the relevant art that the inventor or a joint inventor, or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the inventor(s), at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention.
Regarding claim 9, which was introduced in the amendment filed 10/1/25:
The amended limitation of “sanitizing, before storing the content in a locally controlled database”, is not supported by the specification in any way. There is inadequate support in the specification since there are no embodiments, drawings, flowcharts, or examples given in the specification detailing the sanitizing before storing in a database.
Regarding claim 25, which was introduced in the amendment filed 10/1/25:
The specification does not repeat the language of claim 25 or show any support for it. There are no embodiments, drawings, flowcharts, or examples given in the specification detailing the relationship or outside network. Accordingly, the claim limitation is considered as new matter since the specification does not satisfy the written description requirement, and gives no indication that the inventors had possession of this type of feature.
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 9,10,12-16,18-28 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.
In claim 9, line 11 recites “… information, other than a direct request for content…”. This limitation appears incomplete. It is unclear if the content referred to here is the crawled content or the sanitized content, and how it relates to the rest of the claim.
Claims 15 and 26 suffer the same deficiency as claim 9 and are rejected based on the same rationale. Furthermore, all dependent claims inherit the deficiencies of their respective parent claims and fail to provide a remedy, and are thus rejected based on the same rationale.
In claim 27, line 1 recites “wherein a unique identifier is assigned…”. It is unclear if this is the same unique identifier as mentioned in claim 26 line 11, or if it is a different unique identifier.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
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.
Claims 9,15,21,22,24,25,26,27 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lai et al (US Patent 11196754) in view of Bernaschi et al (“Onion under Microscope”, April 2022) in further view of Rubin et al (US Publication 20050108554).
In reference to claim 9, Lai teaches a method, comprising:
crawling content offered by a plurality of services; (see at least column 3 lines 21-45 & column 6 lines 23-49, which teach intercepting and filtering content from a plurality of message services)
sanitizing content from a plurality of services into sanitized content that represents potentially malicious content in a non-malicious form; (see at least column 7 lines 36-52 and column 7 line 53 – column 8 line 25, which teach sanitizing potentially malicious content into a sanitized form)
storing, the sanitized content in association with a unique identifier for each service of the plurality of services that individual sanitized content items of the sanitized content were generated from; (see at least column 8 line 51 – column 9 line 17, which teach storing the sanitized content associated with a unique link identifier of the service from which the sanitized content was generated from)
receiving a request for information, other than a direct request for content, related to a given service of the plurality of services; (see at least column 6 lines 40 – column 7 line 26, which teaches receiving a request for sanitized content other than the original message) and
providing, in response to the request, the information based on the sanitized content (see at least column 8 lines 13-25 & 60-67, which teach responding to the request based on the sanitized content).
Lai fails to explicitly teach crawling content offered by a plurality of onion services; and also fails to explicitly teach storing in a database the sanitized content associated with a unique identifier. However, Bernaschi teaches crawling content offered on the Tor web/onion services and storing them into a dataset/database (see Bernaschi, at least pg 1287 Abstract, & pgs 1290-1291, § 2, ¶s 1-3). Furthermore, Bernaschi teaches classifying each service in the dataset with a unique classification tag/identifier (see Bernaschi, at least pgs 1291-1292, § 2 all ¶s and pg 1293 Table 2). It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Lai based on the teachings of Bernaschi for the purpose of performing in-depth content analysis of dark web services.
Lai fails to explicitly teach the content represents potentially malicious content hosted by a service, and sanitizing, before storing the content in a locally controlled database, the content. However, Rubin teaches a network device scanning potentially malicious content received from Internet sources (see Rubin, at least ¶s 29,30,33). And furthermore, Rubin teaches sanitizing the content via generating a hash value of the content and then storing the sanitized/hash value of the content in local storage (see Rubin, at least ¶s 36,41). It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Lai based on the teachings of Rubin for the purpose of improving security and protection against content that poses a danger to the receiving device.
In reference to claim 11, this is taught by Lai, see at least column 8 lines 40-45, which teaches malicious/illicit images.
In reference to claim 21, this is taught by Bernaschi, see at least pg 1291 & pg 1304 Appendix A, which teaches a crawling pipeline that extracts information from the onion network and crawling for unknown content. It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Lai based on the teachings of Bernaschi according to the rationale given for claim 9.
In reference to claim 22, this is taught by Rubin, see at least ¶s 36,41, which teaches content scanning that prevents potentially malicious content from being stored. It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Lai based on the teachings of Rubin in accordance to the rationale given for claim 9.
In reference to claim 24, this is taught by Bernaschi, see at least pg 1292, top half, and pg 1293, Table 2, which teaches categorizing the content and identifying content such as social media, marketplace, porn, link list, and cryptocurrency. It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Lai based on the teachings of Bernaschi in accordance to the rationale given for claim 9.
In reference to claim 25, this is taught by Bernaschi, see at least pg 1289 § 1.1 ¶ 3, which teaches determining characteristics and relationships between onion services and domain isolated from other Tor services. It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Lai based on the teachings of Bernaschi in accordance to the rationale given for claim 9.
In reference to claim 27, this is taught by Bernaschi, see at least pg 1289 § 1.1 ¶ 3, pg 1290 § 1.2 ¶ 1, and pg 1312 citation #2, which teaches identifying content from onion services in a (DUTA) dataset, and where sanitized classification labels are associated with the content offered from the onion services. It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Lai based on the teachings of Bernaschi in accordance to the rationale given for claim 9.
Claims 15,17,26 are slight variations of the rejected claims 9,11,21,22,24 above, and are therefore rejected based on the same rationale.
Claims 10,16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lai et al (US Patent 11196754) in view of Bernaschi et al (“Onion under Microscope”, April 2022) in further view of Rubin et al (US Publication 20050108554) in further view of Hao et al (”It’s Not What It Looks Like”, November 2021).
In reference to claim 10, Lai teaches the malicious content includes images that are sanitized (see Lai, at least column 8 lines 40-67). Lai fails to explicitly teach hashing the images via different and perceptual hashing to capture features/scenes present in the images. However, Hao teaches image analysis by hashing images via difference and perceptual hashing to capture features in the images (see Hao, at least pg 69 “Abstract”, pg 70 § 2, pg 76 § 5.5, and pg 83 Appendix A). It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Lai based on the teachings of Hao for the purpose of image searching and match analysis when searching within malicious images.
Claim 16 is a slight variations of the rejected claim 10 above, and is therefore rejected based on the same rationale.
Claims 12,18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lai et al (US Patent 11196754) in view of Bernaschi et al (“Onion under Microscope”, April 2022) in further view of Rubin et al (US Publication 20050108554) in further view of Karpman et al (US Patent 11995803).
In reference to claim 12, Lai fails to explicitly teach prefiltering images included in the content that are below a given number of pixels to omit from the content that is sanitized. However, Karpman teaches image analysis and pre-processing a set of images to remove low quality/resolution images from the set of images to be included in the image analysis (see Karpman, at least column 10 line 37 – column 11 line 9). It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Lai based on the teachings of Karpman for the purpose of processing only important or relevant images, and increasing efficiency .
Claim 18 is a slight variations of the rejected claim 12 above, and is therefore rejected based on the same rationale.
Claims 13,19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lai et al (US Patent 11196754) in view of Bernaschi et al (“Onion under Microscope”, April 2022) in further view of Rubin et al (US Publication 20050108554) in further view of Sevier (US Patent 12120282).
In reference to claim 13, Lai fails to explicitly teach fingerprinting a source camera for any images in the content via PRNU noise hashing. However, Sevier teaches determining camera source of images via PRNU hashing (see Sevier, at least Abstract and column 7 lines 1-18).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Lai based on the teachings of Sevier for the purpose of improved image analysis by verifying the image source.
Claim 19 is a slight variations of the rejected claim 13 above, and is therefore rejected based on the same rationale.
Claims 14,20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lai et al (US Patent 11196754) in view of Bernaschi et al (“Onion under Microscope”, April 2022) in further view of Rubin et al (US Publication 20050108554) in further view of Boys et al (US Publication 2008006506).
In reference to claim 14, Lai teaches the malicious content includes images that are sanitized (see Lai, at least column 8 lines 40-67). Bernaschi teaches providing search results from the onion services (see Bernaschi, at least). Rubin teaches the procedure for sanitizing content to generate a hash (see Rubin, at least ¶). Lai fails to explicitly teach reverse image search comprising: receiving a queried for image; sanitizing, using a same procedure as used for sanitizing the content, the queried for image to generate a hash; and providing a search result matching the hash for the queried for image. However, Boys teaches requesting a reverse image search (see Boys, at least Abstract and ¶s 55,57), generating image signatures (see Boys, at least ¶s 29,39), and providing search results matching the requested images (see Boys, at least ¶s 56,58). It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Lai based on the teachings of Boys for the purpose of providing enhanced searching capabilities for different types of media content.
Claim 20 is slight variations of the rejected claim 14 above, and is therefore rejected based on the same rationale.
Claim 23 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lai et al (US Patent 11196754) in view of Bernaschi et al (“Onion under Microscope”, April 2022) in further view of Rubin et al (US Publication 20050108554) in further view of Stevens et al (US Publication 20210157858).
In reference to claim 23, Bernaschi teaches providing crawling results from the onion services (see Bernaschi, at least pgs 1290-1291). Lai/ Bernaschi fails to explicitly teach the crawling includes a job queue including URLs for the plurality of services to crawl; and a hash table configured to deduplicate URLs from the queue, add previously visited URLs to recrawl, and check statuses of visited domains. However, Stevens teaches URL crawling queue, a deduplication queue and hash entries for the queue, and checking the crawling status (see Stevens, at least ¶s 1032,1034,1035, 1037,1053,1056). It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Lai based on the teachings of Stevens for the purpose of optimizing the management and operation of data crawling.
Claim 28 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lai et al (US Patent 11196754) in view of Bernaschi et al (“Onion under Microscope”, April 2022) in further view of Rubin et al (US Publication 20050108554) in further view of Suh et al (US Patent 12586065).
In reference to claim 28, Bernaschi teaches cryptocurrency analysis (see Bernaschi, at least pg 1292 and Table 2). Lai/Bernaschi fails to explicitly teach wherein the property selected for analysis among the plurality of onion services includes cryptocurrency wallet information, wherein the information related to the property includes a transaction history of an associated cryptocurrency wallet. However, Suh teaches cryptocurrency transaction history analysis related to cryptocurrency addresses and wallets (see Suh, at least columns 11-12 & claim 1). It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Lai based on the teachings of Suh for the purpose of improving the deciphering the nature of cryptocurrency transactions .
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.
For any subsequent response that contains new/amended claims, Applicant is required to cite its corresponding support in the specification. (See MPEP chapter 2163.03 section (I.) and chapter 2163.04 section (I.) and chapter 2163.06) Applicant may not introduce any new matter to the claims or to the specification.
In formulating a response/amendment, Applicant is encouraged to take into consideration the prior art made of record but not relied upon, as it is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. See Forms 892
Contact & Status
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/RAMY M OSMAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2457
May 1, 2026
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