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 .
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claim(s) 12-18, 20-28, and 30-31 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tew et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0228919, hereinafter “Tew”) in view of McLarty et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 20070041550, hereinafter “McLarty”).
Claims 12 and 22:
Tew discloses a call processor for processing a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) media call (§ 0162, Lines 12-16; Call processor 40 can be made compatible with VoIP (Voice over IP) telephone systems) between a first entity and a second entity (§ 0160, Lines 7-8; Call processor 40 is an intermediary for all such calls between caller 10 and agent 20), the VoIP media call including separate signaling streams and media streams (§ 0162, Lines 12-16; VoIP media calls have at least one signaling stream and one media stream), and in which the media streams include a stream over which media is transmitted from the first entity to the second entity without passing through the call processor (§ 0017, Lines 4-9; A second “safe” mode, wherein potentially sensitive data sent by the first entity is prevented from reaching the second entity whilst voice communication between the two entities remains unaffected), the call processor embodied in computer hardware (Fig. 3(a), Element 40), the call processor configured to at least:
redirect the VoIP media call via the call processor, the VoIP media call as redirected including respective streams over which the media transmitted from the first entity is received at the call processor, and forwarded from the call processor to the second entity (§ 0160, Lines 7-10; Call processor 40 is an intermediary for all such calls between caller 10 and agent 20 and is arranged such that the agent 20 has no means by which to circumvent the call processor 40 and interact with the caller 10 directly); and
modify the media received at the call processor from the first entity to remove sensitive information before the media is forwarded to the second entity (§ 0017, Lines 4-9; A second “safe” mode, wherein potentially sensitive data sent by the first entity connected via the first, optionally telephone, interface is prevented from reaching the second entity connected via the second, optionally telephone, interface, whilst voice communication between the two entities remains unaffected).
Tew does not appear to disclose the media streams include a Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) stream over which media is transmitted from the first entity to the second entity without passing through the call processor.
McLarty discloses the media streams include a Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) stream over which media is transmitted from the first entity to the second entity without passing through the call processor (§ 0055, Lines 8-11; The session between the calling terminal 12 and the call reception terminal 14 is established and RTP may be used to directly transmit media content between the respective terminals 12, 14).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Tew’s media stream to be in the RTP format and be used to transmit content directly between terminals, as taught by McLarty, in order to take advantage of the RTP standard and preserve confidentiality of the content.
The method of claim 22 is implemented by the system of claim 12 and is therefore rejected with the same rationale.
Claims 13 and 23:
Tew in view of McLarty further discloses wherein the call processor is configured to modify the media to remove DTMF tones comprising the sensitive information before the media is forwarded to the second entity (Tew, § 0175; The DTMF tones may be modified from their original tones or masked with a single frequency tone or a random tone, effectively removing the original DTMF tones comprising the sensitive information).
Claims 15 and 25:
Claims 15 and 25 are analyzed (which claim the “second entity to first entity” direction or flow of data) with respect to claims 12 and 22 (which claim the “first entity to second entity” direction or flow of data).
Tew in view of McLarty discloses the limitations “wherein the media streams include a second RTP stream over which media is transmitted from the second entity to the first entity without passing through by the call processor, and the VoIP media call as redirected includes second respective RTP streams over which the media transmitted from the second entity is received at the call processor, and forwarded from the call processor to the first entity, and wherein the call processor is further configured to modify the media received at the call processor from the second entity to remove sensitive information before the media is forwarded to the first entity” because Tew discloses call processor 40 is an intermediary for all such calls between caller 10 and agent 20 (§ 0160, Lines 7-8). Thus, Tew’s “safe” mode would operate similarly for either the first entity or the second entity.
Claims 16 and 26:
Tew in view of McLarty further discloses wherein the call processor is configured to modify the media to remove DTMF tones comprising the sensitive information before the media is forwarded to the first entity (Tew, § 0175; The DTMF tones may be modified from their original tones or masked with a single frequency tone or a random tone, effectively removing the original DTMF tones comprising the sensitive information).
Claims 18 and 28:
Tew in view of McLarty further discloses wherein the call processor is further configured to receive a message from the second entity to redirect the VoIP media call (Tew, § 0020, Lines 1-4; The call processor is adapted to switch between first and second modes in response to receiving a mode-switching data signal at the first or at the second telephone interface), the call processor configured to redirect the VoIP media call responsive to the message (Tew, § 0017, Lines 1-9; A telephone call processor can be switched between a first “normal” mode and a second “safe” mode).
Claims 20 and 30:
Tew in view of McLarty further discloses wherein the call processor is further configured to again redirect the VoIP media call after the media is modified to remove the sensitive information, the VoIP media call as again redirected being between the first entity and the second entity without passing through by the call processor (Tew, § 0017, Lines 4-9; A second “safe” mode, wherein potentially sensitive data sent by the first entity connected via the first telephone interface is prevented from reaching the second entity connected to the second telephone interface, whilst voice communication between the two entities remains unaffected).
Claims 21 and 31:
Tew in view of McLarty further discloses wherein the call processor configured to again redirect the VoIP media call includes the call processor configured to recreate the RTP stream (McLarty, § 0055, Lines 8-11; The session between the calling terminal 12 and the call reception terminal 14 is established and RTP may be used to directly transmit media content between the respective terminals 12, 14) over which media is transmitted from the first entity to the second entity (Tew, § 0017, Lines 4-9; A second “safe” mode, wherein potentially sensitive data sent by the first entity connected via the first telephone interface is prevented from reaching the second entity connected to the second telephone interface, whilst voice communication between the two entities remains unaffected. The modified RTP stream corresponds to the claimed recreated RTP stream).
Claim(s) 14, 17, 24, and 27 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tew et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0228919, hereinafter “Tew”) in view of McLarty et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 20070041550, hereinafter “McLarty”); further in view of Erhart et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0082342, hereinafter “Erhart”).
Claims 14 and 24:
Tew in view of McLarty discloses the call processor as recited in claim 12 and the method as recited in claim 22.
Tew in view of McLarty does not appear to disclose wherein the call processor is configured to modify the media to remove spoken sensitive information before the media is forwarded to the second entity.
Erhart discloses wherein the call processor is configured to modify the media to remove spoken sensitive information before the media is forwarded to the second entity (§ 0032, Lines 1-2; Data-processing system 101 analyzes the audio stream in order to omit its private content) (§ 0030, Lines 5-10; Private audio content may be present in the caller speech waveform and/or the agent speech waveform).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Tew and McLarty’s call processor with features of Erhart’s data-processing system in order to support removal of private content in live feeds (Erhart, § 0021, Lines 7-9).
Claims 17 and 27:
Tew in view of McLarty discloses the call processor as recited in claim 12 and the method as recited in claim 22.
Tew in view of McLarty does not appear to disclose wherein the call processor is configured to modify the media to remove spoken sensitive information before the media is forwarded to the first entity.
Erhart discloses wherein the call processor is configured to modify the media to remove spoken sensitive information before the media is forwarded to the second entity (§ 0032, Lines 1-2; Data-processing system 101 analyzes the audio stream in order to omit its private content) (§ 0030, Lines 5-10; Private audio content may be present in the caller speech waveform and/or the agent speech waveform).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Tew and McLarty’s call processor with features of Erhart’s data-processing system in order to support removal of private content in live feeds (Erhart, § 0021, Lines 7-9).
Claim(s) 19 and 29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tew et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0228919, hereinafter “Tew”) in view of McLarty et al. (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 20070041550, hereinafter “McLarty”); further in view of Westlake (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2017/0026516, hereinafter “Westlake”).
Claims 19 and 29:
Tew in view of McLarty discloses the call processor as recited in claim 12 and the method as recited in claim 22.
Tew in view of McLarty does not appear to disclose wherein the second entity is a contact centre configured to send a message to a secure data collection server to indicate secure data collection is to be initiated on the VoIP media call, and receive a personal identification number from the secure data collection server, and wherein the call processor is configured to redirect the VoIP media call based on the personal identification number.
Westlake discloses wherein the second entity is a contact centre (§ 0043, Line 4; The call center is the second party) configured to send a message to a secure data collection server to indicate secure data collection is to be initiated on the VoIP media call (§ 0054; The signaling data may be modified in response to an external signal received by the signaling processor 3005 for example a signal transmitted by a call center worker to indicate that sensitive information is about to be input), and receive a personal identification number (“Call-ID”) from the secure data collection server (§ 0043, Lines 3-5; Telephone calls are delivered to a call center over an IP-based network using SIP. SIP messages contain a “Call-ID” field in the header that is the same for all requests and responses sent by either user agent in a dialog/session), and wherein the call processor is configured to redirect the VoIP media call based on the personal identification number (See citation above. SIP messages contain a “Call-ID” field in the header that is the same for all requests and responses sent by either user agent in a dialog/session).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Tew and McLarty’s call processor with features of Westlake’s system in order to secure transmission of sensitive information during a call between a caller and an agent such that the agent does not receive the sensitive information (Westlake, § 0003).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see pages 2-5, filed 05/21/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 12-18, 20-28, and 30-31 under 35 USC 103 (Tew in view of Erhart) have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Tew and McLarty. McLarty discloses, in § 0055, Lines 8-11, that the session between the calling terminal 12 and the call reception terminal 14 is established and RTP may be used to directly transmit media content between the respective terminals 12, 14.
Accordingly, this action is being made non-final.
Conclusion
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/NAM T TRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2455
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