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
This Office Action is in response to the communication and claim amendment filed on 05/30/2025; Claims 1, 11, and 21 have been amended; Claims 3-4, 10-11, and 17-18 have been canceled. Claims 1, 8, and 15 are independent claims. Claims 1-2, 5-7, 8-9, 12-14, 15-16, and 19-20 have been examined and are pending. This Action is made non-FINAL.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 07/02/2025 is being considered by the examiner.
Drawings
The drawings were received on 04/03/2025. These drawings are reviewed and accepted by the Examiner.
Double Patenting
The nonstatutory double patenting rejection is based on a judicially created doctrine grounded in public policy (a policy reflected in the statute) so as to prevent the unjustified or improper timewise extension of the “right to exclude” granted by a patent and to prevent possible harassment by multiple assignees. A nonstatutory double patenting rejection is appropriate where the conflicting claims are not identical, but at least one examined application claim is not patentably distinct from the reference claim(s) because the examined application claim is either anticipated by, or would have been obvious over, the reference claim(s). See, e.g., In re Berg, 140 F.3d 1428, 46 USPQ2d 1226 (Fed. Cir. 1998); In re Goodman, 11 F.3d 1046, 29 USPQ2d 2010 (Fed. Cir. 1993); In re Longi, 759 F.2d 887, 225 USPQ 645 (Fed. Cir. 1985); In re Van Ornum, 686 F.2d 937, 214 USPQ 761 (CCPA 1982); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); In re Thorington, 418 F.2d 528, 163 USPQ 644 (CCPA 1969).
A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on nonstatutory double patenting provided the reference application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with the examined application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. See MPEP § 717.02 for applications subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA as explained in MPEP § 2159. See MPEP § 2146 et seq. for applications not subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . A terminal disclaimer must be signed in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(b).
The filing of a terminal disclaimer by itself is not a complete reply to a nonstatutory double patenting (NSDP) rejection. A complete reply requires that the terminal disclaimer be accompanied by a reply requesting reconsideration of the prior Office action. Even where the NSDP rejection is provisional the reply must be complete. See MPEP § 804, subsection I.B.1. For a reply to a non-final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.111(a). For a reply to final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.113(c). A request for reconsideration while not provided for in 37 CFR 1.113(c) may be filed after final for consideration. See MPEP §§ 706.07(e) and 714.13.
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Claims 1, 8, and 15 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 7, and 13 respectively of US Patent No.: 12,271,460. Although the conflicting claims are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because all limitations recited in claims 1, 8, and 15 of the instant application are anticipated by limitations recited in claim 1, 7, and 13 of the US Patent No.: 12,271,460.
Claims 2, 9, and 16 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 2, 8, and 14 respectively of US Patent No.: 12,271,460. Although the conflicting claims are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because all limitations recited in claims 2, 9, and 14 of the instant application are anticipated by limitations recited in claim 2, 9, and 14 of the US Patent No.: 12,271,460.
Claims (5, 6), (12-13), and 19 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over claims (4,5), (10,11), and 13 respectively of US Patent No.: 12,271,460. Although the conflicting claims are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because all limitations recited in claims (5, 6), (12-13), and 19 of the instant application are anticipated by limitations recited in claim (4,5), (10,11), and 13 of the US Patent No.: 12,271,460.
Claims 7, 14, and 20 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 6, 12, and 17 respectively of US Patent No.: 12,271,460. Although the conflicting claims are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because all limitations recited in claims 7, 14, and 20 of the instant application are anticipated by limitations recited in claim 6, 12, and 17 of the US Patent No.: 12,271,460.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 1-2, 7-9, 14-16, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Chan et at. (“Chan,” US 2021/0044578) in view of Turgeman ("Turgeman '476," US 10,776,476) and further in view of Turgeman ("Turgeman '246," US 2015/0213246 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Chan teaches an electronic computing device comprising:
a memory including a user account (Chan: fig. 3, pars. 0021, a memory 305, par. 0022, user account (315)); and
an electronic processor communicatively coupled to the memory (Chan: fig. 3, par. 0021, an electronic processor 300 and memory 305; par. [0023], "The method 400 is performed by the electronic processor 300, when the electronic processor 300 executes the authentication software application 320"), the electronic processor is configured to
receive a request to access the user account and biometric data associated with the request (Chan: par. 0002, "biometric data associated with the action of entering the login credentials is collected"; par. 0023, At step 405, the electronic processor 300 receives, from a user device (for example, the first user device 105) a request to access a user account (for example, the user account 315) [] insufficient biometric data to authenticate the user, and behavioral features that may be used to authenticate the user; claim 3, "the request includes biometric data in addition to the behavioral features"),
determine whether an autofill assistance occurred while the biometric data was captured (Chan: claim 4, "the electronic processor is configured to determine a reason that there is insufficient biometric data to authenticate the user; and depending on the reason for the insufficient amount of biometric data, determine which behavioral features to analyze"; par. 0037, when the request to access the user account 315 is received in step 405 of the method 400, the electronic processor 300 may determine the reason that there is insufficient biometric data to authenticate the user. Depending on the reason for the insufficient amount of biometric data (for example, whether login credentials are entered with an autofill function or a copy and paste function; par. [0002], "biometric data associated with the action of entering the login credentials is collected"; par. [0003], "an insufficient amount of biometric data for authenticating a user may be available to be collected when a user enters login credentials using an autofill function or a copy and paste function"; par. 0014, As described above, in some cases insufficient biometric data for authenticating a user may be collected when a user attempts to login to an account. In these cases, behavioral data may be used to authenticate a user in addition to or in place of biometric data. For example a user may attempt to access a bank account from their mobile phone by entering a usemame and password (login credentials) to a webpage displayed in a web browser on their mobile phone. However, a feature may be enabled in the web browser that allows the web browser to automatically enter the user's credentials when the webpage is displayed. “When the username and password are automatically entered, little to no biometric data (for example, keystroke rate) may be collected; par. 0023),
perform user authentication (Chan: [0004], "When it is determined that the login attempt is being made by the user associated with the user account, the user is authenticated"; claim 1, "compare the match value to one or more predetermined thresholds to determine whether the behavioral features included in the request to access the user account authenticates the user, does not authenticate the user, or is inconclusive").
Chan does not explicitly disclose responsive to determining that the autofill assistance occurred while the biometric data was captured, identify data associated with the autofill assistance in the biometric data.
However, in an analogous art, Turgeman '476 discloses
identify data associated with characters not entered by the user in monitored keystroke data (Turgeman '476: Col. 15, lines 37-44, "a keystrokes spacing module 245 may be used to detect anomalies or fraud based on expected or observed gaps in keystroke entry. For example, an automated script may input data by emulating a fixed-rate typist which types at a generally fixed rate (e.g., one character every second; or one character every half-a-second); whereas, a human user may not have a fixed time-gap among keystrokes"; Col. 15, lines 48-53 "a human user typically enters certain groups of keystrokes more rapidly and/or with reduced time-gaps (or with almost no time gaps), and this may be used by the keystrokes spacing module 245 to differentiate between (i) a human user, and (ii) an automated script which enters characters in a synthetic or artificial manner"; Col. 15, lines 11-18, "The interaction data correlator 242 may perform grouping into batches, and may notice that the manual input that was received corresponds to: a first batch of 10 characters, followed after ten seconds by a second batch of 6 characters; whereas, the data in the wire command (as manipulated by the automated scripts) corresponds to batches of 11+5 characters, and thus does not match the grouping or batching of the manual user interactions".).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Turgeman '476 with the method and system of Chan to include responsive to determining that the autofill assistance occurred while the biometric data was captured, identify data associated with the autofill assistance in the biometric data. One would have been motivated to do so in order to "enrich and augment the pool of user interactions from which the system extracts one or more user-specific features," which are "used as part of the user authentication process" (Turgeman '476: Abstract), thereby improving the reliability of the authentication Chan performs on biometric data Chan itself identifies as insufficient. Such a combination is the application of a known technique to a known device ready for improvement to yield predictable results.
Turgeman '476 does not explicitly disclose generate second biometric data by excluding the data associated with the autofill assistance from the biometric data; and “perform user authentication based on the second biometric data.”
However, in an analogous art, Turgeman '246 discloses generate a second set of interaction data by excluding a portion of the logged interaction data (Turgeman '246: par. [0036], the module "logs or records or stores or uploads to the server, or analyzes, only anonymous data, or only data that excludes the actual content of user interactions ... e.g., by logging or storing only the data-entry rate or timing, or the key-presses rate or timing, and while not storing (or while discarding) the actual key-presses or content types"); and
perform user authentication based on the second set of interaction data ( (Turgeman '246: par. [0038], "the user-specific feature extraction module 101 may optionally create a current or ad-hoc user profile 116 that characterizes the user-specific features that are currently exhibited in the current session of user interactions"; par. [0039], "A comparator/matching module 104 may compare or match, between: (i) values of user-specific features that are extracted in a current user session (or user interaction), and (ii) values of respective previously-captured or previously-extracted user-specific features (of the current user ...) ... the comparator/matching module 104 may compare between the current ad-hoc user profile 116, and one or more previously-stored user profiles 117 that are stored in the database 103"; par. [0040], "If the comparator /matching module 104 determines that one or more features, or a set of features, that characterize the current interaction session of the current user, does not match those features as extracted in previous interaction session(s) of that user, then, a possible-fraud signal may be generated").
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Turgeman '246 with the method and system of Chan and Turgeman '476 to include generate second biometric data by excluding the data associated with the autofill assistance from the biometric data; and (f) perform user authentication based on the second biometric data. One would have been motivated to do so because Turgeman '246 demonstrates that "detecting identity of a user of an electronic device" and "differentiating among users of a computerized service" (Turgeman '246: [0014]) remain available when only a portion of the logged interaction data is used, allowing Chan's system to continue authenticating on the biometric data Chan identifies as insufficient rather than relying solely on substitute behavioral features. This is consistent with Chan's own teaching that "biometric data may be used in combination with behavioral features to authenticate a user" (Chan: [0004]). Such a combination is the combination of prior art elements according to known methods to yield predictable results.
Regarding claim 2, the combination of Chan, Turgeman '476, Turgeman '246 teaches the electronic computing device of claim 1. The combination of Chan, Turgeman '476, Turgeman '246 further teaches wherein the electronic processor is further configured to:
responsive to determining that the autofill assistance did not occur while the biometric data was captured, perform user authentication based on the biometric data (Chan: par. [0002], "When the user subsequently enters the login credentials associated with the user account, biometric data associated with the action of entering the login credentials is collected. The collected biometric data is then compared to the biometric data profile associated with the user account to determine whether the login credentials are being entered by the user associated with the user account"; claim 3, "the electronic processor is configured to utilize the behavioral features to authenticate the user when the biometric data is insufficient to authenticate the user"; par. [0003], "an insufficient amount of biometric data for authenticating a user may be available to be collected when a user enters login credentials using an autofill function or a copy and paste function").
Regarding claim 7, the combination of Chan, Turgeman '476, Turgeman '246 teaches the electronic computing device of claim 1. The combination of Chan, Turgeman '476, Turgeman '246 further disclose wherein, to identify the data associated with the autofill assistance in the biometric data, the electronic processor is further configured to identify the data associated with the autofill assistance in the biometric data from information in the request, pre-set exclusion settings, or an active determination between autofill biometric data and non-autofill biometric data (Turgeman '476: Col. 15, lines 48-53, "a human user typically enters certain groups of keystrokes more rapidly and/or with reduced time-gaps (or with almost no time gaps), and this may be used by the keystrokes spacing module 245 to differentiate between (i) a human user, and (ii) an automated script which enters characters in a synthetic or artificial manner 'impregnated' or augmented with pseudo-random time-gaps"; Col. 15, lines 64-67, "These properties may be monitored and analyzed by the keystrokes spacing module 245; and may be utilized in order to distinguish or differentiate between (a) a human user, and (b) an automated script").
Regarding claim 8, claim 8 is directed to a method associated with the device claimed in claim 1; claim 8 is similar in scope to claim 1, and is therefore rejected under similar rationale.
Regarding claim 9, claim 9 is similar in scope to claim 2, and is therefore rejected under similar rationale.
Regarding claim 14, claim 14 is similar in scope to claim 7, and is therefore rejected under similar rationale.
Regarding claim 15, claim 15 is directed to a non-transitory computer-readable medium (Chan: fig. 3, pars. 0008, 0018) comprising instructions that, when executed by an electronic processor (Chan: fig. 3, pars. [0021], [0023]), causes the electronic processor to perform a set of operations associated with the device claimed in claim 1; claim 15 is similar in scope to claim 1, and is therefore rejected under similar rationale.
Regarding claim 16, claim 16 is similar in scope to claim 2, and is therefore rejected under similar rationale.
Regarding claim 20, claim 20 is similar in scope to claim 7, and is therefore rejected under similar rationale.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to CANH LE whose telephone number is (571)270-1380. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday to Friday 6:00AM to 3:30PM other Friday off.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Luu Pham, can be reached at telephone number 571-270-5002. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Canh Le/
Examiner, Art Unit 2439
August 16th, 2026
/LUU T PHAM/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2439
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