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 an AMENDMENT entered on June 24, 2026 for patent application 18/679,040 filed on May 30, 2024.
Claims 1-5 are pending.
Claim Objections
Claim 5 is objected to because of the following informalities: it is listed as “Original,” even though it was amended in the response dated August 27, 2025. Appropriate correction is required.
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 1-5 are 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. Claim 1 recites the limitation “said MABR device receiving from said session router a redirect response including data based upon said modified encrypted request indicating a redirection for said client device to receive said content from said MABR device,” in lines 7-9. The syntax of this limitation makes in unclear what is being claimed.
There are at least 2 valid interpretations of the limitation in question.
First, the limitation could mean that the redirect response included data “based upon said modified encrypted request indicating a redirection,” meaning the limitation as a whole could be interpreted to require “said MABR device receiving from said session router a redirect response, said redirect response including data based upon said modified encrypted request indicating a redirection for said client device to receive said content from said MABR device.”
Second, the limitation could mean that the redirect response included data “indicating a redirection,” meaning the limitation as a whole could be interpreted to require “said MABR device receiving from said session router a redirect response, said redirect response including data based upon said modified encrypted request; said redirect response indicating a redirection for said client device to receive said content from said MABR device.”
That is to say, it is unclear what part of the claim language is modified by the “based on” language, and thus the claim as a whole is vague and indefinite. Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claims 1-3 and 5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kwon et al. (Pub. No.: US 2023/0379516) in view of Schneider et al. (Pat. No.: 6,408,336) and Hunter (Pub. No.: US 2014/0006951).
Regarding claim 1, Kwon discloses a method for providing content to a client device comprising: (a) a Multicast Adaptive Bit Rate (MABR) device receiving an encrypted request for content from said client device (paras. [0099]; “The multicast bootstrap function processes an initial request for a presentation manifest received through the reference point B from the content playback function”); (b) said MABR device modifying said encrypted request from said client device and providing said modified encrypted request to a session router (Fig. 7, paras. [0140]-[0151]); (c) said MABR device receiving from said session router a response including data based upon said modified encrypted request indicating how said client device can receive said content from said MABR device (Figs. 52 and 53, paras. [0498]-[0526], [0692] and [0798]).
It could be argued that Kwon does not explicitly disclose (b) said MABR device modifying said encrypted request from said client device, without decrypting said encrypted request, and providing said modified encrypted request to a session router. However, in analogous art, Schneider discloses that “[a]uthentication also permits encryption to be done in the same fashion: the first access filter encountered by the request encrypts the request after it has checked the access, and the other access filters pass the encrypted request through without decrypting it until the last access filter before the server that contains the data item being accessed by the request is reached (col. 48, ln. 29-35).” Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Kwon to allow for said MABR device modifying said encrypted request from said client device, without decrypting said encrypted request, and providing said modified encrypted request to a session router. This would have produced predictable and desirable results, in that “[d]oing encryption and decryption in this fashion reduces the amount of encryption and decryption and distributes the encryption and decryption that is done in the same fashion as with access checking (Schneider, col. 48, ln. 35-38).”
It could be further argued that the combination of Kwon and Schneider does not explicitly disclose (c) said MABR device receiving from said session router a redirect response including data based upon said modified encrypted request indicating a redirection for said client device to receive said content from said MABR device, and said MABR device providing said redirect response to said client device and said MABR device providing a certificate to said client device to enable said client device to authenticate said MABR device. However, in analogous art, Hunter discloses that “there is expected to be one OnDemandProgram Fragment per Media Set of an Editorial Version. A Media Set comprises one or more media files transcoded at different bit rates, but all encoding identical source pictures and/or sound (para. [2017]),” wherein “the On-demand Publication describes a set of encoded media files intended for the Adaptive Streaming service, the acceptable quality corresponds to the bit rate of one of these streams (para. [2497]),” and further that “[t]he IDS 7004 looks up the device's IP address, based on the HTTP request and maps it to an Autonomous System (AS) number 460. It then sends an HTTP 302 redirect response 468, redirecting the client to a new URI 470. The IDS redirects to a URI where the base URI of the HTTP request is replaced by the base URI that was provided by the ISP (para. [1470]),” and that “[c]ertificate-based authentication may additionally be supported by the implementation (para. [1920]).” Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Kwon and Schneider to allow for said MABR device receiving from said session router a redirect response including data based upon said modified encrypted request indicating a redirection for said client device to receive said content from said MABR device, and said MABR device providing said redirect response to said client device and said MABR device providing a certificate to said client device to enable said client device to authenticate said MABR device. This would have produced predictable and desirable results, in that it would allow for techniques well-known in the art to be used to properly and securely route and deliver the desired content to a user.
Regarding claim 2, the combination of Kwon, Schneider and Hunter discloses the method of claim 1, and further discloses wherein said encrypted request is based upon Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure (Kwon, paras. [0662] and [0784]).
Regarding claim 3, the combination of Kwon, Schneider and Hunter discloses the method of claim 1, and further discloses wherein said MABR device includes an Internet Protocol address that includes a fully qualified domain name (Kwon, Fig. 7, paras. [0140]-[0151]).
Regarding claim 5, the combination of Kwon, Schneider and Hunter discloses the method of claim 1, and further discloses wherein said modifying includes adding metadata to said encrypted request identifying said MABR device (Schneider, col. 4, ln. 8-24. This claim is rejected on the same grounds as claim 1.).
Claim 4 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kwon et al. (Pub. No.: US 2023/0379516) in view of Schneider et al. (Pat. No.: 6,408,336), Hunter (Pub. No.: US 2014/0006951) and Lee et al. (Pub. No.: US 2021/0144141).
Regarding claim 4, the combination of Kwon, Schneider and Hunter discloses the method of claim 1, but it could be argued that the combination does not explicitly disclose wherein said encrypted request includes a domain name with a transport layer security end-point of said session router. However, in analogous art, Lee discloses that “the EKMS 170 may be accessible via public endpoint (i.e., a public IP address) that has a public domain name and a transport layer security (TLS) certificate for the domain name rooted in a public certificate authority (CA) (para. [0028]).” Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Kwon, Schneider and Hunter to allow for said encrypted request to include a domain name with a transport layer security end-point of said session router. This would have produced predictable and desirable results, in that it would allow for well-known techniques to be used to improve the security of the system.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to all claims have been considered but are moot in view of the new grounds of rejection in view of Schneider and Hunter, as well as the newly presented 35 USC § 112 rejection.
Conclusion
Claims 1-5 are rejected. Claim 5 is objected to.
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.
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/Joshua D Taylor/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2426 September 9, 2026
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