DETAILED ACTION
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 reply to the amendments filed on August 5, 2026.
• Claims 10, 24, 31, and 33 have been amended and are hereby entered.
• Claims 1-9, 13-20, 23, and 32 have been canceled.
• Claims 10-12, 21-22, 24-31, and 33-34 are currently pending and have been examined.
• This action is made FINAL.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments filed August 5, 2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
The Examiner is withdrawing the 35 USC § 103 rejections due to Applicant’s amendments.
Applicant’s arguments with respect to 35 USC § 101 have been fully considered and are not persuasive.
Regarding Applicant’s argument on page 7, that the claims do not recite an abstract idea, the Examiner respectfully disagrees. As indicated in the 35 USC § 101 rejection below, the claimed inventions allows for requesting payment credentials including a payment token, dynamic expiry data, and a dynamic token verification code to use for a payment method for a transaction. The Specification at Page 3, lines 9-10 discloses “The present inventors have now recognized an opportunity to further enhance security and convenience of e-commerce transactions.” The Specification and claims focus on improving security and convenience of e-commerce transactions, which is a commercial and legal interaction, specifically a commercial interaction of sales activities or behaviors, and therefore is an abstract idea.
Regarding Applicant’s arguments on pages 6-7, that the claims integrate a practical application, the Examiner respectfully disagrees. Under the Patent Subject Matter Eligibility analysis, Step 2A, prong two, integration into a practical application requires an additional element(s) or a combination of additional elements in the claim to apply, rely on, or use the judicial exception in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception, such that the claim is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception. Limitations that are not indicative of integration into a practical application are those that generally link the use of the judicial exception into a particular technological environment or field of use-see MPEP 2106.05(h). Here the claims recite a customer device; online transaction; an e-commerce server computer; a browser interface; a payment application of the customer device; and digitally signing with a cryptographic key such that they amount to no more than generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use (e.g., a computer network) (see MPEP 2106.05(h)).
Furthermore, and in response to Applicant’s arguments on page 7 where Applicant argues an improvement to technology, in determining whether a claim integrates a judicial exception into a practical application, a determination is made of whether the claimed invention pertains to an improvement in the functioning of the computer itself or any other technology or technical field (i.e., a technological solution to a technological problem). Here, the claims recite generic computer components, i.e., a generic processor, a memory storing a computer program executable by the processor to perform the claimed method steps and system functions. The processor, memory and system are recited at a high level of generality and are recited as performing generic computer functions customarily used in computer applications.
Furthermore, the Specification describes a problem and improvement to a business or commercial process at least at [0010], disclosing “The present inventors have now recognized an opportunity to further enhance security and convenience of e-commerce transactions.”
Applicant’s reliance upon Example 41, on pages 7-8, is misplaced. As an initial matter, with respect to USPTO Examples, the Examiner analyzes the claims under the two part framework under Alice/Mayo. The Examples provided in Office Guidance are hypothetical and intended to be illustrative only. While some of the fact patterns in the examples draw from U.S. Supreme Court and U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit decisions, the examples do not carry the weight of court decisions. The eligible claims in hypothetical Example 41 were found to be eligible because the combination of additional elements use the mathematical formulas and calculations in a specific manner that sufficiently limits the use of the mathematical concepts to the practical application of transmitting the ciphertext word signal to a computer terminal over a communication channel. The claims of the Example were found to secure private network communications, so that a ciphertext word signal can be transmitted between computers of people who do not know each other or who have not shared a private key between them in advance of the message being transmitted, where the security of the cipher relies on the difficulty of factoring large integers by computers. Turning to the instant application, the additional elements are recited at a high level of generality such that they amount to no more than generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use (e.g., a computer network) (see MPEP 2106.05(h)). The Examiner finds no parallel between the Applicant’s claims and the hypothetical, patent-eligible claims described in Example 41.
Regarding Applicant’s arguments on page 8 regarding the prior art, the argument has been considered and is not persuasive. In response to this argument, the Examiner notes that the inventiveness inquiry of § 101 should not be confused with the separate novelty inquiry of § 102 or obviousness inquiry of § 103. A novel and non-obvious claim directed to a purely abstract idea is, nonetheless, patent ineligible. See Mayo, 566 U.S. at 79. “Even assuming that is true, it does not avoid the problem of abstractness.” Affinity Labs, 838 F.3d at 1263; Ultramercial, Inc. v. Hulu, LLC, 772 F.3d 709, 716 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (“That some of [these] steps were not previously employed in this art is not enough—standing alone—to confer patent eligibility upon the claims ”). Indeed, “a claim for a new abstract idea is still an abstract idea.” Synopsys, Inc. v. Mentor Graphics Corp., 839 F.3d 1138, 1151 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (explaining that the search for an inventive concept under § 101 is distinct from demonstrating novelty under § 102).
The claims are not patent eligible.
For the reasons above, Applicant’s arguments are not persuasive.
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 10-12, 21-22, 24-31, and 33-34 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention recites an abstract idea without significantly more. Independent claims 10 and 31 are directed to a method (claim 10) and an apparatus (claim 31). Therefore, on its face, each independent claim 10 and 31 are directed to a statutory category of invention under Step 1 of the Patent Subject Matter Eligibility analysis (see MPEP 2106.03).
Under Step 2A, Prong One of the Patent Subject Matter Eligibility analysis (see MPEP 2106.04), claims 10 and 31 recite, in part, a system, a method, and an apparatus of organizing human activity. Claim 10 recites a method comprising: operating to initiate a transaction with an entity; determining the entity supports a dynamic-data payment method; interacting to confirm support of the dynamic-data payment method; sending a request for payment credentials for the transaction; receiving the requested payment credentials, the received payment credentials including a payment token, dynamic expiry data and a dynamic token verification code; and transmitting the received payment credentials to the entity for use with the dynamic-data payment method; wherein the payment token, the dynamic expiry data and the dynamic token verification code collectively uniquely correspond to the transaction and the dynamic token verification code is generated by: concatenating the payment token with at least one item of numeric transaction data to form a first numeric string; signing the first numeric string to form a second numeric string; and selecting three leading digits of the second numeric string to be the dynamic token verification code.
Claim 31 recites similar limitations as claim 10 above, and further recites receiving a user input to initiate a transaction.
The limitations, as drafted, is a process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers fundamental economic principles or practices and commercial and legal interactions (certain methods of organizing human activity), but for the recitation of generic computer components. The claims as a whole recite a method of organizing human activity. The claimed inventions allows for requesting payment credentials including a payment token, dynamic expiry data, and a dynamic token verification code to use for a payment method for a transaction, which is a fundamental economic principle or practice of mitigating risk and a commercial and legal interaction including sales activities or behaviors. The mere nominal recitation of a customer device and e-commerce server computer do not take the claim out of the methods of organizing human activity grouping. Thus, the claims recite an abstract idea.
Under Step 2A, Prong Two of the Patent Subject Matter Eligibility analysis (see MPEP 2106.04), the judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particular, the additional elements of a customer device; online transaction; an e-commerce server computer; a browser interface; a payment application of the customer device; and digitally signing with a cryptographic key are recited at a high-level of generality (i.e., as a generic computer performing generic computer functions of requesting payment credentials, receiving payment credentials to be used in a transaction) such that it amounts to no more than generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use (e.g., a computer network).-see MPEP 2106.05(h).
Accordingly, the combination of 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. The claims are directed to an abstract idea.
Under Step 2B of the Patent Subject Matter Eligibility analysis (see MPEP 2106.05), the claim(s) does/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, the additional elements in the claims amount to no more than generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use (see MPEP 2106.05(h)). Generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use using generic computer components cannot provide an inventive concept.
The claims are not patent eligible.
The dependent claims have been given the full two part analysis including analyzing the additional limitations both individually and in combination. The dependent claim(s) when analyzed both individually and in combination are also held to be patent ineligible under 35 U.S.C. 101 because for the same reasoning as above and the additional recited limitation(s) fail(s) to establish that the claim(s) is/are not directed to an abstract idea. Dependent claims 11 and 33-34 simply further describes the technological environment. Dependent claims 12, 21-22, and 24-30 simply help to define the abstract idea. The additional limitations of the dependent claim(s) when considered individually and as an ordered combination do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea.
Viewing the claim limitations as an ordered combination does not add anything further than looking at the claim limitations individually. When viewed either individually, or as an ordered combination, the additional limitations do not amount to a claim as a whole that is significantly more than the abstract idea. Accordingly, claims 10-12, 21-22, 24-31, and 33-34 are ineligible.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
US 20160232525 A1 (“Cateland”) discloses a request may be received for a transaction. In response to the request, a nonce value may be generated. A cryptographic key may be used to cryptographically process a payment token with the nonce value to produce a security code. The payment token, the nonce value and the security code may be transmitted together as payment credentials. In some cases, the nonce value may be in the format for a payment account expiration date.
US 20170373852 A1 (“Cassin”) discloses systems and methods for validating transactions using a cryptogram. One embodiment of the invention is directed to a method of processing a remote transaction initiated by a communication device provisioned with a token.
US 20170255932 A1 (“Aabye”) discloses receiving a token from a plug-in application to conduct a transaction associated with a user of a communicating device. The process may include sending an authentication request to a remote access control sever to authenticate the user, and receiving, from the remote access control server, an authentication tracking value that the remote access control server used in generation of an authentication cryptogram.
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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 RAVEN E YONO whose telephone number is (313)446-6606. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday 8-5PM EST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Bennett M Sigmond can be reached at (303) 297-4411. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/RAVEN E YONO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3694
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