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
Claim Objections
Claim 2, objected to because of the following informalities:
claim 2 should
claims 7 and 8 should recite:
manage user-related information that indicates information related to the user…
execute, as a transaction process, a process…
Appropriate correction as above or the like is required.
Drawings
The drawings were received on 08/04/25. These drawings are acceptable.
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.
Claims 5 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 5 recites the limitation "the information relating" in line 2. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claims 5, 7 and 8 recite the limitation "the electronic commerce information" in lines 4, 13 and 12 respectively. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claims 5, 7 and 8 recite information relating to the electronic commerce and the electronic commerce information respectively. It is unclear what information is being referred to.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
(a) A patent may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1-4, and 6 are rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over Kramme (2021/0065186).
Kramme discloses:
[Claim 1] (Previously Amended) An electronic commerce approval system for approving a given electronic commerce based on a crypto-asset when the electronic commerce is executed by a supplier and a client, the system comprising one or more processors and one or more memories, the processor programmed to:
manage activity location and scope information which is information registered in advance in a storage unit and which indicates a location or scope of an activity, serving as a reference for an activity of each user who is a supplier or a client (0167, The geolocation data may be time-stamped data received from a third-party server with the express consent of the authorized cardholder, or retrieved from a database in which the data was stored. 0168, (0168] It may then be determined that the second geographic location corresponds to the first geographic location);
identify a transaction target person based on transaction target person information relating to at least one of the supplier and the client, the transaction target person information being transmitted from a server when the electronic commerce between the supplier and the client is executed by the server (0167, The geolocation data may include…cardholder), data indicating that the authorized cardholder had "checked in" at a particular location (e.g., via a social media or other application)…The geolocation data may be time-stamped data received from a
third party server…or retrieved from a database);
execute an approval process of approving the electronic commerce between the identified supplier and the client (0168, For example, it may be determined at block 410 that the first and second geographic locations are the same (e.g., the same city), are within a same geographic territory (e.g., cities within the same state), or are within a threshold distance of each other; 0169 In response to the determination at block 410, the fraud alert may be marked as a false positive (block 412), such that no fraud alert is sent to the authorized cardholder in connection with the financial transaction.).
provide the result of the approval process to the server (0169, a "verified" flag or field associated with the fraud alert may be set to a value of "0" or "false" at block 412,), wherein the processor programmed to perform the approval process including:
a transaction location acquisition process of acquiring location information for transaction target person at the time of approval indicating current location information of the transaction target person when the approval of the electronic commerce is executed (0167, location of the cardholder at the time of the financial transaction may be determined by matching a time-stamp to the time determined at block 406,); and
a condition determination process: of comparing the acquired location information for transaction target person at the time of approval with the registered activity location and scope information for the user who is the transaction target person; and of determining whether the result of comparison satisfies a given condition (0168, It may then be determined that the second geographic location corresponds to the first geographic location (block 410).), and
determine whether the electronic commerce is approved based on a result of the condition determination process (0169, a "verified" flag or field associated with the fraud alert may be set to a value of "0" or "false" at block 412,).
Kramme does not specifically recite approval of financial transactions but alludes to such by stating that embodiments prevent the financial transaction from being executed if the second geographic location does not correspond to the first (0007). Conversely, if the second geographic location corresponds to the first, no fraud alert is sent (0008). I.e., the transaction is allowed to proceed.
Claim 6 is similarly rejected.
[Claim 2] (Previously Amended) The electronic commerce approval system according to claim 1, wherein:
the processor is programmed to:
acquire current location information indicating a current location of the user at a given timing or at each predetermined timing (0167, The geolocation data may include…cardholder), data indicating that the authorized cardholder had "checked in" at a particular location (e.g., via a social media or other application)…The geolocation data may be time-stamped data received from a
third party server…or retrieved from a database); and
register the acquired current location information in the storage unit as historical information of an activity location and scope of the user (0167, The geolocation data may be time-stamped data received from a third-party server with the express consent of the authorized cardholder, or retrieved from a database in which the data was stored.), and
execute, as the approval process, the condition determination process based on:
at least one of the acquired location information of the transaction target user at the time of approval and historical information of the transaction target user already registered (Claim 15, retrieving, by the one or more processors and from a memory, one or more locations previously associated with the authorized cardholder; determining, by the one or more processors, a first geographic location at which the computing device resides; determining, by the one or more processors, that a fraud alert exists for the financial transaction, at least in part by comparing the first geographic location to the one or more locations); and
the registered activity location and scope information of the transaction target user (0167, The geolocation data may include…cardholder), data indicating that the authorized cardholder had "checked in" at a particular location (e.g., via a social media or other application)…The geolocation data may be time-stamped data received from a third-party server…or retrieved from a database).
[Claim 3] (Previously Amended) The electronic commerce approval system according to claim 1, wherein:
the processor programmed to:
acquire the current location information indicating a current location of the user at a given timing or at each predetermined timing (0167, The geolocation data may include…cardholder), data indicating that the authorized cardholder had "checked in" at a particular location (e.g., via a social media or other application)…The geolocation data may be time-stamped data received from a third party server…or retrieved from a database);
execute a determination process of the scope of activity for determining authenticity of the scope of activity of the user by comparing the acquired current location information and activity location and scope information registered with the activity location and scope information of the corresponding user (0167, location of the cardholder at the time of the financial transaction may be determined by matching a time-stamp to the time determined at block 406, 0168, It may then be determined that the second geographic location corresponds to the first geographic location (block 410).); and
reject, as the approval process, the approval of a target electronic commerce when the user whose authenticity of the scope of the activity is denied by the determination process of the scope of activity is at least one of the supplier and the client (embodiments prevent the financial transaction from being executed if the second geographic location does not correspond to the first (0007), it may be determined at block 410 that the first and second geographic locations are the same (e.g., the same city), are within a same geographic territory (e.g., cities within the same state), or are within a threshold distance of each other).
[Claim 4] (Previously Amended) The electronic commerce approval system according to claim 2, wherein:
the current location information includes timing information indicating a timing when the current location information is acquired (0167, The geolocation data may include…cardholder), data indicating that the authorized cardholder had "checked in" at a particular location (e.g., via a social media or other application)…The geolocation data may be time-stamped data received from a
third party server…or retrieved from a database).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to WILLIAM E RANKINS whose telephone number is (571)270-3465. The examiner can normally be reached on 9-530 M-F.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Bennett Sigmond can be reached on 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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/WILLIAM E RANKINS/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3694
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