DETAILED ACTION
This Office Action is in response to the Amendment filed on November 24th, 2025.
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.
In the instant Amendment, claims 1, 8-9, 13-14 & 19-20 have been amended; claims 1, 13 & 18 are independent; claim 16 was canceled; and claim 21 has been added. Claims 1-15 & 17-21 have been examined and are pending. This Action is made FINAL.
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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see pages 11-14, filed 11/24/2025, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1-10 & 12-19 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(a)(1), and with respect to the rejection(s) of claims 11 & 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 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 Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn.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 Ramaswamy.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
Claim(s) 1-10, 12-15, 17-19 & 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ford et al. (Ford), U.S. Pub. Number 2021/0014216, in view of Ramaswamy et al. (Ramaswamy), U.S. Pub. Number 2023/0171257.
Regarding claim 1; Ford discloses a method for facilitating access to a target device by an accessing device, the method comprising:
providing, by a server (par. 0022; an access management server 112.), a device administration portal (par. 0023; an administration portal 104a.) at a web browser application of the accessing device (par. 0022; an administration device 108a.);
providing, by the server (par. 0022; an access management server 112.), a device access application (par. 0023; the user portal service 116.) for installation at the accessing device (par. 0022; an administration device 108a.);
providing, by the server (par. 0022; an access management server 112.) and to the accessing device (par. 0022; an administration device 108a.), a session token based on an indication of successful user authentication by the accessing device (pars. 0047-0048; the user 102b may navigate his/her web browser to the appropriate fields of the sign-on page of the user portal, enter a username and password into the sign-on page, and submit the entered username and password; during this sign-on process, an authentication of the user’s identity may be generated (e.g., in the form of an authentication token).); and
based on a target device access request received at the device administration portal, instructing the device access application to connect to the target device using the session token (pars. 0049-0050; a query is transmitted to the access management server 112; the query includes an identifier of the user 102b and a request for identification of applications to which the user 102b is permitted access; the query may include the authentication of the user’s identity generated during the sign on; the access management server 112 can validate the authenticity of the user’s identity; the query may be generated automatically upon sign on and/or initiated by the user 102b; a response to the query is transmitted from the access management server 112 for display in the user portal 104b; the response includes a list of third-party applications to which the user is permitted access.).
Ford fails to explicitly disclose receiving, by the server and from the target device, an authentication request containing the session token.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Ramaswamy discloses system and method for system access credential delegation comprising receiving, by the server and from the target device, an authentication request containing the session token (Ramaswamy: par. 0041; upon receiving the authentication request, the authorization server 306 validates the session token, the phone number of the delegator 312 by matching it with the phone in the EAP token in the authentication request, account information related to the delegator 312 to ensure that he has delegation authority, the signature in the session token and the EAP token in the authentication request.).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Ramaswamy into the system of Ford comprising receiving, by the server and from the target device, an authentication request containing the session token to grant websites and applications access to their information (Ramaswamy: par. 0001).
Regarding claim 2; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 1, wherein Ford further discloses the accessing device comprises a computing device implementing a user interface configured to receive user input and supply user output and wherein the target device comprises a network device (Ford: par. 0026; the administrator portal service 110 is hosted by the access management server 112 on the network 136 and generally facilitates display of the user interface of the administrator portal 104a on the device 108a of the administrator 102a; the administrator portal service 110 may include a virtual server that is communicatively coupled to the access management server 112 and the device 108a.).
Regarding claim 3; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 2, wherein Ford further discloses the device access application establishes a session to the network device to perform device administration of the network device (Ford: par. 0024; information stored in the permission database 140 is generally maintained by a trusted entity that is responsible for establishing and maintaining access permissions for each user; for instance, the information in the permission database 140 may be updated after a given user 102b is no longer associated with the entity to remove the user’s permissions to access any of the third-party applications.).
Regarding claim 4; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 1 Ford further discloses comprising: generating, by the server, the session token in response to the indication of successful user authentication by the accessing device, wherein the session token is unique to a session between the accessing device and the target device (Ford: par. 0040; if the first response from the permission server 114 indicates that the first user 126 is permitted access to the first application, the first user 126 is associated with the sign-on credentials for the application.).
Regarding claim 5; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 4 Ford further discloses comprising: receiving, by the server and from an identity provider system, the indication of successful user authentication by the accessing device; and receiving, by the server and from the identity provider system, user identity information indicative of user network privilege information (Ford: par. 0039; if the permission status corresponds to access being granted to the first user 126, the permission server 114 generates a response corresponding to a confirmation of permission to access the application.).
Regarding claim 6; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 5, wherein Ford further discloses the identity provider system comprises an identity provider server that stores user records containing user credentials of users and corresponding user identity information for the users (Ford: par. 0046; the second entry includes an identifier of the second user 128, the sign-on credentials for the second application, and the network address for the sign-on page of the second application.).
Regarding claim 7; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 5 Ford further discloses comprising: storing, by the server, a session record containing the generated session token and the received user identity information (Ford: par. 0048; an authentication of the user’s identity may be generated (e.g., in the form of an authentication token).).
Regarding claim 8; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 1 Ramaswamy further discloses comprising: authenticating, by the server, the session token in the received authentication request to facilitate access to the target device by the accessing device (Ramaswamy: par. 0041; the authorization server 306 validates the session token, the phone number of the delegator 312 by matching it with the phone in the EAP token in the authentication request, account information related to the delegator 312 to ensure that he has delegation authority, the signature in the session token and the EAP token in the authentication request.).
Regarding claim 9; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 1 Ford further discloses comprising: storing, by the server, a database of session records; identifying, by the server, a given session record out of the session records in the database using the session token contained in the received authentication request; and sending, by the server and to the target device, an authentication response containing a user access profile in the identified session record (Ford: par. 0035; the access management server hosts a session of the administration portal 104a on the network 136 for receiving user input from administrator 102a.).
Regarding claim 10; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 9, wherein Ford further discloses the authentication request and the authentication response comprise messages based on a secure Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service protocol (Ford: par. 0034; data transfer protocols such as TCP/IP, SMTP, or others, wired or wireless without limitation or restriction.).
Regarding claim 12; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 1 Ford further discloses comprising: maintaining, by the server, a connection to the accessing device to maintain the connection between the device access application and the target device for device administration (Ford: par. 0026; the administrator 102a may be an individual who is authorized to control and modify which users may access third-party applications; while the administrator 102a can provide this initial authorization, the system 100 is configured such that the administrator 102a cannot circumvent the rules set in place by the permission data 132 by, for instance, associating a user 102b to an application 138 that is not permitted based on the permission data 132.).
Regarding claim 13; Claim 13 is directed to one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media which has similar scope as claim 1. Therefore, claim 13 remains un-patentable for the same reasons.
Regarding claims 14-17; Claims 14-17 are directed to the one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of claim 13 which have similar scope as claims 2-10 & 12. Therefore, claims 14-17 remain un-patentable for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 18; Claim 18 is directed to a method which has similar scope as claim 1. Therefore, claim 18 remains un-patentable for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 19; Claim 19 is directed to the method of claim 18 which has similar scope as claim 10. Therefore, claim 19 remains un-patentable for the same reasons.
Regarding claim 21; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose the method defined in claim 18, wherein Ford further discloses the network device is connected to the accessing device by a communication session between the accessing device and the network device and wherein the session-specific key is unique to the communication session (Ford: par. 0040; if the first response from the permission server 114 indicates that the first user 126 is permitted access to the first application, the first user 126 is associated with the sign-on credentials for the application.).
Claims 11 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C 103(a) as being unpatentable over Ford et al. (Ford), U.S. Pub. Number 2021/0014216, in view of Ramaswamy et al. (Ramaswamy), U.S. Pub. Number 2023/0171257, and further in view of Senftleber et al. (Senftleber), U.S. Pub. Number 2020/0120068.
Regarding claim 11; Ford and Ramaswamy disclose method defined in claim 9.
Ford and Ramaswamy fail to explicitly disclose the authentication request and the authentication response comprise messages based on a secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Senftleber discloses multiplexed data exchange portal interface in scalable data networks wherein the authentication request and the authentication response comprise messages based on a secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol (Senftleber: par. 0034; data transfer protocols such as HTTP, HTTPs (i.e., hypertext transfer protocol secure).).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skills in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Senftleber into the system of Ford and the system and method of Ramaswamy wherein the authentication request and the authentication response comprise messages based on a secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol to facilitate access to online accounts of social network computing platforms securely without the limitations of conventional techniques (Senftleber: par. 0006).
Regarding claim 20; Claim 20 is directed to the method of claim 19 which has similar scope as claim 11. Therefore, claim 20 remains un-patentable for the same reasons.
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 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 KHOI V LE whose telephone number is (571)270-5087. The examiner can normally be reached on 9:00 AM - 5:00 PM EST.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Shewaye Gelagay can be reached on 571-272-4219. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. For more information about the PAIR system, see http://pair-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative or access to the automated information system, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/KHOI V LE/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2436