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 office action is in response to the Pre-Brief Appeal Conference Decision of 7/21/2026. The instant application has claims 1-20 pending. The system, method and medium for producing an modified code based on mapping dummy values to secrets. There a total of 20 claims.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1-20 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-5, 9-12, 16-19 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 1,6-8,13-15, 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Thwarting Memory Disclosure with Efficient Hypervisor-enforced Intra-domain Isolation to Liu1 in view of CryptoGuard: High Precision Detection of Cryptographic Vulnerabilities in Massive-sized Java Projects to Rahaman.
Regarding claim 1, 8, 15, Liu discloses A method, comprising: receiving a file comprising one or more secrets that are stored within a source code of a software application(Abstract & 2.1 Approach Overview, the secrets are prevented from being revealed during execution of application); generating one or more dummy values(Figure 1 & § 3.1 Memory Protection, maps the secrets); mapping each of the one or more secrets to a corresponding dummy value of the one or more dummy values(3.2 Securing Execution Flow); replacing each of the one or more secrets that are stored within the source code with the corresponding dummy value to generate a modified source code(Page 1612 § Deployment 1-3, the untrusted application is loaded with secrets dummy counterpart).
But Liu does not disclose storing the modified source code and the mapping in a data store.
In the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention, Rahman discloses storing the modified source code and the mapping in a data store(§ 2.1 Threat Model & § 3 Map Vulnerabilities to Analysis & §4. Crypto-Specific Slicing & Page 2456 right side, CryptoGuard maps the vulnerabilities from crypto-keys or passwords and modified code is loaded and mapped).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of claimed invention to modify Liu invention to incorporate discloses storing the modified source code and the mapping in a data store for the advantage of restrict access to secret data as taught in Rahaman see 2.2 Technical Challenges and Solution Overview..
Regarding claim 6, 13, 20, the combined method/system/medium of Liu and Rahaman, mutatis mutandis, Liu discloses the method of claim 1, comprising partitioning the secret into a first portion and a second portion, storing the first portion in a first memory device, and storing the second portion in a second memory device(2.2 Threat Model and Assumptions, secret compartments & 3.2 Securing Execution Flow, the sensitive functions access to the memory locations).
Regarding claim 7,14, the combined method/system/medium of Liu and Rahaman, mutatis mutandis, Liu discloses the method of claim 1, comprising populating a dummy value of the one or more dummy values by accessing a first memory device and subsequently accessing a second memory device, wherein a first portion of a secret of the one or more secrets is retrieved from the first memory device and a second portion of the secret is retrieved from the second memory device(2.2 Threat Model and Assumptions, secret compartments & 3.2 Securing Execution Flow, the sensitive functions access to the memory locations & 3.1 Memory Protection, the virtual address for secrets).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Venkat Perungavoor whose telephone number is (571)272-7213. The examiner can normally be reached 9-5.
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/VENKAT PERUNGAVOOR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2492 Email: venkatanarayan.perungavoor@uspto.gov
1 As mentioned in the Advisory Action of 6/16/2026 the rejection with new references herein follows. The references are already in file as of 4/17/2026.
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