DETAILED ACTION
Notice of 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 .
Response to Amendment
The preliminary amendment filed 2025-08-20 has been entered and fully considered.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 2025-08-20 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being 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.
Claims 1-7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea (35 U.S.C. 101 Judicial Exception) without significantly more. The claims recite determining whether an anomaly communication has occurred by calculating and displaying a difference between values, which is both a form of generic mathematical relationships, mathematical formulas or equations, mathematical calculations that are thus grouped as a mathematical concepts and a form of observation, evaluation, judgment, opinion, which is a concept performed in the human mind and thus grouped as mental processes. This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the generically recited computer elements do not add a meaningful limitation to the abstract idea because they amount to simply implementing the abstract idea on a computer. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the additional elements, when considered separately and in combination, do not add significantly more to the abstract idea, as they are well-understood, routine, conventional computer functions as recognized by the courts.
Based upon consideration of all the relevant factors with respect to the claimed invention as a whole, the claims are determined to be directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. The rationale for this determination is explained infra:
The following are Principles of Law:
A patent may be obtained for “any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof”; 35 U.S.C. § 101. The Supreme Court has consistently held that this provision contains an important implicit exception: laws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas are not patentable; See Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 134 S. Ct. 2347, 2354 (2014); Gottschalk v. Benson, 409 U.S. 63, 67 (1972) (“Phenomena of nature, though just discovered, mental processes, and abstract intellectual concepts are not patentable, as they are the basic tools of scientific and technological work”). Notwithstanding that a law of nature or an abstract idea, by itself, is not patentable, an application of these concepts may be deserving of patent protection; See Mayo Collaborative Servs. v. Prometheus Labs., Inc., 132 S. Ct. 1289, 1293–94 (2012). In Mayo, the Court stated that “to transform an unpatentable law of nature into a patent-eligible application of such a law, one must do more than simply state the law of nature while adding the words ‘apply it.’” Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1294 (citation omitted).
In Alice, the Court reaffirmed the framework set forth previously in Mayo “for distinguishing patents that claim laws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas from those that claim patent-eligible applications of these concepts”; Alice, 134 S. Ct. at 2355. The test for determining subject matter eligibility requires a first step of determining whether the claims are directed to a process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter. If the claims are directed to one of the four patent-eligible subject matter categories, then the Examiner must perform a two-part analysis to determine whether a claim that is directed to a judicial exception recites additional elements that amount to significantly more than the exception. The first part of the second step in the analysis is to “determine whether the claims at issue are directed to one of those patent-ineligible concepts”; Id. If the claims are directed to a patent-ineligible concept, then the second part of the second step in the analysis is to consider the elements of the claims “individually and ‘as an ordered combination’” to determine whether there are additional elements that “‘transform the nature of the claim’ into a patent-eligible application”; Id. (quoting Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1298, 1297). In other words, the second step in the analysis is to “search for an ‘inventive concept’‒ i.e., an element or combination of elements that is ‘sufficient to ensure that the patent in practice amounts to significantly more than a patent on the [ineligible concept] itself.’” Id. (brackets in original) (quoting Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1294). The prohibition against patenting an abstract idea “cannot be circumvented by attempting to limit the use of the formula to a particular technological environment or adding insignificant post-solution activity”; Bilski v. Kappos, 561 U.S. 593, 610–11 (2010) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). The Court in Alice noted that “[s]imply appending conventional steps, specified at a high level of generality,” was not “enough” [in Mayo] to supply an “‘inventive concept.’” Alice, 134 S. Ct. at 2357 (quoting Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1300, 1297, 1294).
In the “2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance” (2019 PEG), the USPTO has prepared revised guidance for use by USPTO personnel in evaluating subject matter eligibility based upon rulings by the courts.
The Examiner is bound by and applies the framework as set forth by the Court in Mayo and reaffirmed by the Court in Alice and follows the 2019 PEG for determining whether the claims are directed to patent-eligible subject matter.
Step 1: Are the claims at issue directed to a process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter?
The Examiner finds that the claims are directed to one of the four statutory categories.
Step 2A – Prong One: Does the claim recite an abstract idea, law of nature, or natural phenomenon?
The Examiner finds that the claims are directed to the abstract idea of determining whether an anomaly communication has occurred by calculating and displaying a difference between values, which is both a form of generic mathematical relationships, mathematical formulas or equations, mathematical calculations that are thus grouped as a mathematical concepts and a form of observation, evaluation, judgment, opinion, which is a concept performed in the human mind and thus grouped as mental processes.
Step 2A – Prong Two: Does the claim recite additional elements that integrate the Judicial Exception into a practical application?
The abstract idea is not integrated into a practical application because the generically recited computer elements do not add a meaningful limitation to the abstract idea because they amount to simply implementing the abstract idea on a computer.
In determining whether the abstract idea was integrated into a practical application, the Examiner has considered whether there were any limitations indicative of integration into a practical application, such as:
(1) Improvements to the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field; See MPEP § 2106.05(a)
(2) Applying or using a judicial exception to effect a particular treatment or prophylaxis for a disease or medical condition; See Vanda Memo (Recent Subject Matter Eligibility Decision: Vanda Pharmaceuticals Inc. v. West-Ward Pharmaceuticals)
(3) Applying the judicial exception with, or by use of, a particular machine; See MPEP § 2106.05(b)
(4) Effecting a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing; See MPEP § 2106.05(c)
(5) 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; See MPEP § 2106.05(e) and Vanda Memo
The Examiner notes that clam features of: determining whether an anomaly communication has occurred by calculating and displaying a difference between values do not improve the functioning of a computer or technical field, do not effect a particular treatment or prophylaxis for a disease or medical condition, do not apply or use a particular machine, do not effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing, and do not apply or use 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.
Instead of a practical application, the claim features of determining whether an anomaly communication has occurred by calculating and displaying a difference between values merely use a general-purpose computer as a tool to perform the abstract idea (See MPEP § 2106.05(f)) and merely generally link the use of the abstract idea to a field of use (See MPEP § 2106.05(h)). Thus, the Examiner finds that the claimed invention does not recite additional elements that integrate the Judicial Exception into a practical application.
Step 2B: Is there something else in the claims that ensures that they are directed to significantly more than a patent-ineligible concept?
The claims, as a whole, require nothing significantly more than generic computer implementation or can be performed entirely by a human. The additional element(s) or combination of element(s) in the claims other than the abstract idea per se amount to no more than recitation of generic computer structure (e.g. processing circuitry) that serves to perform generic computer functions (e.g. inputting data, calculating a value, displaying a difference between values, ...) that are well-understood, routine, and conventional activities previously known to the pertinent industry. The claimed anomaly communication, feature, packet, learning model, pieces of learning data, value, monitoring item, and difference are all numbers, data structures, or datum. Each of these elements are individually dispositive of patent eligibility because of the following legal holdings:
“Data in its ethereal, non-physical form is simply information that does not fall under any of the categories of eligible subject matter under section 101”; Digitech Image Techs., LLC v. Electronics for Imaging, Inc., 758 F.3d 1344, 1350 (Fed. Cir. 2014).
The Supreme Court has also explained that “[a]bstract software code is an idea without physical embodiment,” i.e., an abstraction. Microsoft Corp. v. AT&T Corp., 550 U.S. 437, 449 (2007).
A claim that recites no more than software, logic, or a data structure (i.e., an abstract idea) – with no structural tie or functional interrelationship to an article of manufacture, machine, process or composition of matter does not fall within any statutory category and is not patentable subject matter; data structures in ethereal, non-physical form are non-statutory subject matter. In re Warmerdam, 33 F.3d 1354, 1361 (Fed. Cir. 1994); see Nuijten, 500 F.3d at 1357.
Furthermore, the claimed invention does not have a specific asserted improvement in computer capabilities, nor is it a specific implementation of a solution to a problem in the software arts; See Enfish, LLC v. Microsoft Corp., 822 F.3d 1327 (Fed. Cir. 2016). Rather, the claims are merely directed towards determining whether an anomaly communication has occurred by calculating and displaying a difference between values, which is similar to ideas that the courts have found to be abstract, as noted supra, and the claims are without a “practical application” or anything “significantly more”.
Considering each of the claim elements in turn, the function performed by the computer system at each step of the process does no more than require a generic computer to perform a well-understood, routine, and conventional activity at a high level of generality. For example, “inputting a feature of a packet during a given period transmitted and received on a network” is merely receiving or transmitting data over a network, which has been found by the courts to be a well-understood, routine, conventional activity in computers; See e.g. Symantec, 838 F.3d at 1321, 120 USPQ2d at 1362 (utilizing an intermediary computer to forward information); TLI Communications LLC v. AV Auto. LLC, 823 F.3d 607, 610, 118 USPQ2d 1744, 1745 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (using a telephone for image transmission); OIP Techs., Inc., v. Amazon.com, Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1363, 115 USPQ2d 1090, 1093 (Fed. Cir. 2015) (sending messages over a network); buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d 1350, 1355, 112 USPQ2d 1093, 1096 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (computer receives and sends information over a network). Further, “calculate a value for each monitoring item” is merely a form of performing repetitive calculations, which has been found by the courts to be a well-understood, routine, conventional activity in computers; See e.g. Flook, 437 U.S. at 594, 198 USPQ2d at 199 (recomputing or readjusting alarm limit values); Bancorp Services v. Sun Life, 687 F.3d 1266, 1278, 103 USPQ2d 1425, 1433 (Fed. Cir. 2012) (“The computer required by some of Bancorp’s claims is employed only for its most basic function, the performance of repetitive calculations, and as such does not impose meaningful limits on the scope of those claims”). Further note that the abstract idea of determining whether an anomaly communication has occurred by calculating and displaying a difference between values to which the claimed invention is directed has a prior art basis outside of a computing environment, e.g. puzzle games that asks a user which item does not belong in a group.
The prohibition against patenting an abstract idea “cannot be circumvented by attempting to limit the use of the formula to a particular technological environment or adding insignificant post-solution activity”; Bilski v. Kappos, 561 U.S. 593, 610–11 (2010) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). The Court in Alice noted that “[s]imply appending conventional steps, specified at a high level of generality,” was not “enough” [in Mayo] to supply an “‘inventive concept.’” Alice, 134 S. Ct. at 2357 (quoting Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1300, 1297, 1294).
Viewed as a whole, the claims simply recite the steps of using generic computer components. The claims do not purport, for example, to improve the functioning of the computer system itself. Nor does it effect an improvement in any other technology or technical field. Instead, the claims amount to nothing significantly more than an instruction to implement the abstract idea using generic computer components. This is insufficient to transform an abstract idea into a patent-eligible invention.
The dependent claims likewise incorporate the deficiencies of a claim upon which they ultimately depend and are also directed to non-patent-eligible subject matter.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Savalle et al. (US Pre-Grant Publication No. 20180241762-A1, hereinafter “Savalle”).
With respect to independent claim 1, Savalle discloses an anomaly detection device comprising:
processing circuitry configured to {para. 0032: “one or more processors 220, and a memory 240 interconnected by a system bus 250”}:
determine whether anomaly communication has occurred by inputting a feature of a packet during a given period transmitted and received on a network to a learning model trained in advance using a plurality of pieces of learning data {paras. 0039-0044, 0055-0057, and 0093-0094: “SLN process 248 may utilize machine learning techniques, to perform anomaly detection in the network”, the detection is performed on “the packets of traffic flow”, wherein the machine learning-based anomaly detector was trained on “prior/previously detected anomalies”}.
calculate a value for each monitoring item of the packet during the given period when the anomaly communication has occurred {paras. 0061 and 0076: “computation of ‘features’ (e.g., feature vectors)” of “observed network characteristics”}.
visibly display a difference between a value for each monitoring item of the plurality of pieces of learning data and a value for each feature item of the packet during the given period {paras. 0047, 0070-0088, and 0093-0097: computing “a distance between the anomaly under scrutiny and other anomalies raised in the past” and “reporting a detected anomaly to a user interface” including “information regarding the observed characteristics of the traffic that caused the DLA to deem the traffic anomalous”}.
With respect to dependent claim 2, Savalle discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to classify the plurality of pieces of learning data into a plurality of first groups based on a predetermined item, calculate a value for each monitoring item for each classified first group, classify packets during the given period into a plurality of second groups based on the predetermined item, and calculate a value for each monitoring item for each of the classified second groups {paras. 0046-0047: “clustering is a family of techniques that seek to group data according to some typically predefined notion of similarity” and “a distance to a cluster is computed with the hope of reflecting a degree of anomaly (e.g., using a Euclidian distance and a cluster based local outlier factor that takes into account the cluster density)”}.
With respect to dependent claim 3, Savalle discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to visibly display a difference between a value of the monitoring item of the first group and a value of the monitoring item of the second group in which a predetermined item matches {paras. 0047, 0070-0088, and 0093-0097: computing “a distance between the anomaly under scrutiny and other anomalies raised in the past” and “reporting a detected anomaly to a user interface” including “information regarding the observed characteristics of the traffic that caused the DLA to deem the traffic anomalous”}.
With respect to dependent claim 4, Savalle discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to display information regarding a threat assumed for the monitoring item {paras. 0047, 0070-0088, and 0093-0097: computing “a distance between the anomaly under scrutiny and other anomalies raised in the past” and “reporting a detected anomaly to a user interface” including “information regarding the observed characteristics of the traffic that caused the DLA to deem the traffic anomalous”}.
With respect to dependent claim 5, Savalle discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to acquire configuration information and log information of a terminal device from a plurality of terminal devices that transmit and receive the packet and display the configuration information and the log information of the terminal device corresponding to the packet during the given period {para. 0050: “an infrastructure may include certain network devices acting as distributed learning agents (DLAs) and one or more supervisory/centralized devices acting as a supervisory and control agent (SCA). A DLA may be operable to monitor network conditions (e.g., router states, traffic flows, etc.), perform anomaly detection on the monitored data using one or more machine learning models, report detected anomalies to the SCA,”}.
With respect to claims 6-7, a corresponding reasoning as given earlier in this section with respect to claim 1 applies, mutatis mutandis, to the subject matter of claims 6-7; therefore, claims 6-7 are rejected, for similar reasons, under the grounds as set forth for claim 1.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Kevin Bechtel whose telephone number is 571-270-5436. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 09:00 - 17:00 ET.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, William (“Bill”) Korzuch can be reached at 571-272-7589. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Kevin Bechtel/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2491
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