DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted by applicant dated 01/13/2025 has been considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter.
As per claim 15, the claim recites a computer readable storage media, which may be interpreted as a signal or carrier wave. This does not fall under one of the four statutory categories. The examiner suggest amending the claim to recite a non-transitory computer readable storage medium.
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, 13, 15 and 17-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Cheng et al. US 2020/0175207 (hereinafter Cheng), in view of Ratnakaram et al. US 2023/0131232 (hereinafter Ratnakaram).
As per claim 1, Cheng teaches a method for certifying data stored in one or more ledgers produced in a private environment, wherein the method comprises, under the control of a certification computing system: accessing, by the certification computing system, corresponding ledger versions of each of the ledgers being generated by appending corresponding data thereto, the ledger versions being accessed for a sequence of certification instants (Cheng paragraph [0030], [0064], [0067], accessing blockchain),
calculating, by the certification computing system, corresponding ledger digests based on all the data of the ledger versions of each ledger for the certification instants, calculating, by the certification computing system, corresponding version consistency proofs of each ledger for one or more of the certification instants following a creation certification instant of the certification instants corresponding to a creation of the ledger , each of the version consistency proofs of the ledger being for verifying that the ledger version of the ledger for the corresponding certification instant is consistent with respect to the ledger version of the ledger for a preceding one of the certification instants immediately preceding the certification instant along the sequence, meaning that the ledger version for the certification instant contains the ledger version for the preceding certification instant without alteration and that the ledger version for the certification instant has been obtained by extending the ledger version for the preceding certification instant, according to the corresponding ledger digests without knowledge of the corresponding versions of the ledger (Cheng paragraph [0052], [0064]-[0065], [0067], generate hash values), and
exposing, by the certification computing system , verification information outside the private environment comprising storing at least part of the verification information for verifying integrity thereof into a persistent storage of persistent type being external to the private environment, the verification information being based on the ledger digests and the version consistency proofs for allowing one or more external computing systems being external to the private environment to verify that each selected ledger of the ledgers to be verified has a single consistent history, meaning that each of the ledger versions of the selected ledger up to a selected one of the ledger versions of the selected ledger corresponding to a selected one of the certification instants along the sequence contains a preceding one of the ledger versions of the selected ledger for the certification instant immediately preceding the certification instant of the ledger version without alteration and that the ledger version has been obtained by extending the preceding ledger version, without knowledge of the corresponding ledger versions of the selected ledger (Cheng paragraph [0065]-[0070], store hash values in public blockchain).
Cheng does not explicitly disclose computing system being internal to a private environment.
Ratnakaram teaches computing system being internal to a private environment (Ratnakaram paragraph [0031]-[0032], computing system being within enterprise environment).
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Cheng of a certification system that access ledgers and calculates hashes with the teachings of Ratnakaram to include a computing system being within an enterprise environment because the results would have been predictable and resulted in the certification system being within an enterprise environment.
As per claim 13, Cheng in view of Ratnakaram teaches the method according to claim 1, wherein the ledgers are a single ledger, the method comprising: exposing, by the certification computing system, the verification information outside the private environment comprising the ledger digests and the version consistency proofs with at least the ledger digests being stored into the persistent storage (Cheng paragraph [0065]-[0070], store hash values in public blockchain).
As per claims 15 and 17, the claims claim computer program product and a system essentially corresponding to the method claim 1 above, and they are rejected, at least for the same reasons.
As per claim 18, Cheng in view of Ratnakaram teaches an information technology infrastructure for certifying data comprising the certification computing system according to claim 17 and one or more external computing systems each comprising a circuitry for verifying that each selected ledger has the single consistent history according to the verification information without knowledge of the corresponding ledger versions of the selected ledger (Cheng paragraph [0065]-[0070], verifying hash).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-12 and 19-20 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.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to HENRY TSANG whose telephone number is (571)270-7959. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9am - 5pm EST.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Farid Homayounmehr can be reached at (571) 272-3739. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/HENRY TSANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2495
Prosecution Insights