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 .
Status of Claims
This action is in response to applicant arguments filled on 09/15/2025 for application 19014899.
Claim 1, 11, and 16 have been amended.
Claims 1-20 are currently pending and have been examined.
Detailed Action
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.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception (i.e., a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea) without significantly more.
Step 1:
Claims 1-20 are drawn to a method and system, which is/are statutory categories of invention (Step 1: YES).
Step 2A Prong One:
Independent claims 1, 11, and 16 recite filtering the plurality of electronic patient data; and determining that at least one electronic patient data access event of the plurality of electronic patient data access events constitutes a potential non-compliant access of the electronic patient data. The recited limitations, as drafted, under their broadest reasonable interpretation, cover certain methods of organizing human activity by identifying and reporting events preceding a pattern in a set of user data. If a claim limitation, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers managing personal behavior or relationships or interactions between people, then it falls within the “Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity” grouping of abstract ideas. Accordingly, the claims recite an abstract idea (Step 2A Prong One: YES).
Step 2A Prong Two:
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. The claims are abstract but for the inclusion of the additional elements including a computer and processors which are additional elements that are recited at a high level of generality such that they amount to no more than mere instruction to apply the exception using generic computer components. See: MPEP 2106.05(f).
The claims recite the additional element of receiving access data and displaying an indicator of the at least one electronic patient data access event, which are considered limitations directed to insignificant extra-solution activity that does not amount to an inventive concept because the limitations do not impose meaningful limits on the claim such that is it not nominally or tangentially related to the invention. In the claimed context, the claimed receiving limitations are incidental to the performance of the recited abstract idea of identifying and reporting events preceding a pattern in a set of user data. See: MPEP 2106.05(g).
The combination of these additional elements is no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using generic computer components. Accordingly, even in combination, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
Hence, the additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. Accordingly, the claims are directed to an abstract idea (Step 2A Prong Two: NO).
Step 2B:
The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. As discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, using the additional elements to perform the abstract idea amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using generic components. Mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic components cannot provide an inventive concept. See: MPEP 2106.05(f).
Further, the claimed additional elements, identified above, are not sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because they are generic components that are not integrated into the claim because they are merely incidental or token additions to the claim that do not alter or affect how the process steps or functions in the abstract idea are performed. Therefore, the claimed additional elements do not add meaningful limitations to the indicated claims beyond a general linking to a technological environment. See: MPEP 2106.05(h).
Further, the claimed additional elements, identified above, are not sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because they are generic components that are configured to perform well-understood, routine, and conventional activities previously known to the industry. See: MPEP 2106.05(d). Said additional elements are recited at a high level of generality and provide conventional functions that do not add meaningful limits to practicing the abstract idea. The originally filed specification supports this conclusion at Figure 1, and
Paragraph 6-7, where “The apparatus also includes a memory coupled to the at least one processor. [0007] In yet another aspect, a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing computer executable code for presenting electronic patient data accessing information is provided. The code includes code for receiving data related to a plurality of access events, by one or more employees, of electronic patient data, determining a set of access events of the plurality of access events constitute, by the one o rmore employees, possible breach of the electronic patient data, and providing an alert related to the set of access events based on determining that the set of access events constitute possible breach of the electronic patient data..”
Paragraph 23, where “As used herein, the terms "element,""module,""component," and "system"may refer to a computer-related entity, either hardware, a combination of hardware and software, software, or software in execution. For example, a module may be, but is not limited to being, a machine-executable process runningon a processor, a processor, an object, a thread of execution, a machine-executable program, and/or a computer. By way of illustration, both a process running on a server and the server may be a module or a component. One or more modules or components may reside within a process and/or thread of execution. In some implementations, a module may be localized on one computer and/or distributed among two or more computers.”
Paragraph 22, where “As used herein, the term "determining" or "evaluating" encompasses a wide variety of actions. For example, "determining" and "evaluating" may include calculating, computing, processing, deriving, investigating, looking up (e.g., looking up in a table, a database or other data repository, or another data structure), ascertaining, and/or the like. Also, "determining," and "evaluating" may include receiving (e.g., receiving information), accessing (e.g., accessing data in a data repository), and/or the like. Also, "determining" may include resolving, selecting, choosing, establishing, and the like. .”
Paragraph 51, where “This functionality may include substantially any suitable type of application that sends, retrieves, processes, and/or manipulates input data, receives, displays, formats, and/or communicates output data. For example, such interfaces may also be associated with an engine, editor tool, web browser, device application, etc., although other type applications may be utilized. The GUI may include a display having one or more display objects comprising, e.g., configurable icons, buttons, sliders, input boxes, selection options, menus, tabs having multiple configurable dimensions, shapes, colors, text, data and sounds to facilitate operations with the interfaces. In addition, among other things, the GUI may also receive and process user commands from a mouse, touch screen, keyboard, laser pointer, speech input, web site, remote web service and/or other devices such as a camera and/or video content, etc. to affect or modify operations and/or display of the GUI.”
The claims recite the additional element of receiving access data and displaying an indicator, which amounts to extra-solution activity concerning mere data gathering or displaying. The specification (e.g., as excerpted above) does not provide any indication that the additional elements are anything other than well‐understood, routine, and conventional functions when claimed in a merely generic manner (as they are here). See: MPEP 2106.05(g).
Viewing the limitations as an ordered combination, the claims simply instruct the additional elements to implement the concept described above in the identification of abstract idea with routine, conventional activity specified at a high level of generality in a particular technological environment.
Hence, the claims as a whole, considering the additional elements individually and as an ordered combination, do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea (Step 2B: NO).
Dependent claim(s) 2-10, 12-15, and 17-20 when analyzed as a whole, considering the additional elements individually and/or as an ordered combination, are held to be patent ineligible under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the additional recited limitation(s) fail(s) to establish that the claim(s) is/are not directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. These claims fail to remedy the deficiencies of their parent claims above, and are therefore rejected for at least the same rationale as applied to their parent claims above, and incorporated herein.
Response to Arguments
Applicant arguments/amendments overcome the art rejection.
The Applicant argues the 101 rejection. The Applicant states that the claims are directed to concrete systems and methods for determining non-compliant access of electronic patient data. The claims can be performed without human intervention and do not “manage personal behavior or relationships or interactions between people”. The Applicant further argues that the claims integrate any alleged abstract idea into a practical application and are directed to significantly more than the alleged abstract idea. The claims integrate any alleged abstract idea with an improved system that can detect the non-compliant access to electronic patient data without human intervention.
The Examiner respectfully disagrees. The claims recite the steps of analyzing data by filtering and reporting the data (i.e. identifying and reporting events) which covers certain methods of organizing human activity. In addition, the claims do not recite an improved system. The claims recite a specific parameter in which data can be filtered by, but that does not constitute to an improved system. Data can be filtered in many different ways and having a specific parameter in which data is filtered does not integrate the claims into a practical application. The claims do not recite any of the following “• An improvement in the functioning of a computer, or an improvement to other technology or technical field, as discussed in MPEP §§ 2106.04(d)(1) and 2106.05(a); • Applying or using a judicial exception to effect a particular treatment or prophylaxis for a disease or medical condition, as discussed in MPEP § 2106.04(d)(2); • Implementing a judicial exception with, or using a judicial exception in conjunction with, a particular machine or manufacture that is integral to the claim, as discussed in MPEP § 2106.05(b); • Effecting a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing, as discussed in MPEP § 2106.05(c); and • Applying or using the judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment, such that the claim as a whole is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception, as discussed in MPEP § 2106.05(e).”
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 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MAROUN P KANAAN whose telephone number is (571)270-1497. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8:00-5:00.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Mamon Obeid can be reached on (571) 270-1813. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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MAROUN P. KANAAN
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 3687
/MAROUN P KANAAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3687