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 .
Priority
This application is continuation of US Appl. 17/977,621, filed on 10/31/ 2022; now USP 12335293 B2.
Claims 1-20, filed on 05/13/2025, are presented for examination.
Double Patenting
The non-statutory 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 non-statutory 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 non-statutory 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.
The USPTO Internet website contains terminal disclaimer forms which may be used. Please visit www.uspto.gov/patent/patents-forms. The actual filing date of the application in which the form is filed determines what form (e.g., PTO/SB/25, PTO/SB/26, PTO/AIA /25, or PTO/AIA /26) should be used. A web-based eTerminal Disclaimer may be filled out completely online using web-screens. An eTerminal Disclaimer that meets all requirements is auto-processed and approved immediately upon submission. For more information about eTerminal Disclaimers, refer to www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/applying-online/eterminal-disclaimer.
Claims 1-20 are rejected on the ground of non-statutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1-20 of U.S. Patent No. 12335293 B2. Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because the claims are similar (almost the same).
Please see claim-comparison (of independent claim 1) table below,
Instant Application
USP 12335293 B2
1. An apparatus, comprising:
an importance node module configured to compute, via a mathematical function and use of one or more graphs, an importance of a network node in the one or more graphs based on at least two or more factors that at least include a hierarchy of a user in an organization, a job title of the user in the organization, aggregated account privileges from multiple different network domains for the user, and a level of shared resource access for the user, where the importance node module is further configured to supply the one or more graphs as input into an attack path modeling component, where [[the]] network nodes in a network include both network devices as well as user accounts,
where the attack path modeling component is configured to i) understand the importance of a particular network node in the network compared to other network nodes in the network, and ii) determine key pathways within the network and associated vulnerable network nodes in the network that a cyber-attack would use during the cyber-attack, via a modeling of the cyber-attack with at least one of 1) a cyber threat attack simulator and 2) a clone network created in a virtual machine environment of the network under analysis,
where the attack path modeling component is configured to understand the importance of the network nodes in the network compared to the other network nodes in the network based on the supplied input from the importance node module;
where the importance node module and the attack path modeling component are configured to cooperate to analyze the importance of the network nodes in the network compared to other network nodes in the network, and the key pathways within the network and the vulnerable network nodes in the network that the cyber-attack would use during the cyber-attack in order to provide an intelligent prioritization of a remediation action to remediate the cyber-attack for a first network node from the network protected by an Artificial Intelligence (AI) based cyber security system;
a remediation suggester module configured to cooperate with the attack path modeling component to analyze results of the modeling the cyber-attack occurrence for each node in the network and suggest how to perform the intelligent prioritization of a remediation action on the first network node based upon at least an importance of the first network node compared to the other network nodes in at least one of a report and an autonomous remediation action initiated by the remediation suggester to mitigate against the cyber-attack;
one or more processing units configured to execute software instructions associated with the importance node module, the attack path modeling component, and the remediation suggester module; and
one or more non-transitory storage mediums configured to store at least software associated with the with the importance node module, the attack path modeling component, and the remediation suggester module.
1. An apparatus, comprising:
an importance node module configured to compute, via a mathematical function and use of one or more graphs, an importance of a network node in the one or more graphs based on at least two or more factors that at least include a hierarchy of a user in an organization, a job title of the user in the organization, aggregated account privileges from multiple different network domains for the user, and a level of shared resource access for the user, where the importance node module is further configured to supply the one or more graphs as input into an attack path modeling component, where network nodes in a network include both network devices as well as user accounts,
where the attack path modeling component is configured to i) understand the importance of a particular network node in the network compared to other network nodes in the network, and ii) determine key pathways within the network and associated vulnerable network nodes in the network that a cyber-attack would use during the cyber-attack, via a modeling of the cyber-attack with at least one of 1) a cyber threat attack simulator and 2) a clone network created in a virtual machine environment of the network under analysis,
where the attack path modeling component is configured to understand the importance of the network nodes in the network compared to the other network nodes in the network based on the supplied graph input from the importance node module;
where the importance node module and the attack path modeling component are configured to cooperate to analyze the importance of the network nodes in the network compared to other network nodes in the network, and the key pathways within the network and the vulnerable network nodes in the network that the cyber-attack would use during the cyber-attack in order to provide an intelligent prioritization of a remediation action to remediate the cyber-attack for a first network node from the network protected by an Artificial Intelligence (AI) based cyber security system;
a remediation suggester module configured to cooperate with the attack path modeling component to analyze results of the modeling the cyber-attack occurrence for each node in the network and suggest how to perform the intelligent prioritization of a remediation action on the first network node based upon at least an importance of the first network node compared to the other network nodes in at least one of a report and an autonomous remediation action initiated by the remediation suggester module to mitigate against the cyber-attack;
one or more processing units configured to execute software instructions associated with the importance node module, the attack path modeling component, and the remediation suggester module; and
one or more non-transitory storage mediums configured to store at least software associated with the importance node module, the attack path modeling component, and the remediation suggester module.
Independent claim 10 and claim 20 respectively recite method and computer readable version of claim 1; and claims 2-9 and 11-20 are rejected based on their dependence.
Note:
Examiner has contacted applicant’s representative office and requested to file terminal disclaimer. Office Action is requested for review (Interview Summary).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-20 will be allowed if the above non-statutory DP is overcome; i.e., when terminal disclaimer is filed.
A determination for allowance is based on examiner’s thorough search and also based on the patented claims that almost exactly reflect the instant application claims.
Pertinent arts found include,
US 11695795 B2 directed to an agile security platform for enterprise-wide cyber-security and performing actions of receiving, from an agile security platform, analytical attack graph (AAG) data representative of one or more AAGs, each AAG representing one or more lateral paths within an enterprise network for reaching a target asset from one or more assets within the enterprise network, determining, for each instance of a plurality of instances of the AAG, a graph value representing a measure of hackability of the enterprise network at respective times, providing a profile of the enterprise network based on a set of graph values determined for instances of the AAG, the profile representing changes in graph values over time, determining an effectiveness of one or more security controls based on the profile, and selectively executing one or more remedial actions in response to the effectiveness;
and,
US 2018/0234435 A1 directed to A cyber-security system and method for proactively predicting cyber-security threats are provided. The method comprises receiving a plurality of security events classified to different groups of events; correlating the plurality of received security events to classify potential cyber-security threats to a set of correlation types; determining a correlation score for each classified potential cyber-security threat; and determining a prediction score for each classified potential cyber-security threat, wherein the prediction score is determined based in part on the correlation score.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. (See PTO—892).
For example, US 9516053 B1 is pertinent art directed to Network Security Threat Detection By User/user-entity Behavioral Analysis.
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to AMARE F TABOR whose telephone number is (571) 270-3155. The examiner can normally be reached Mon.—Fri.: 8:00 Am to 5:00 PM.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, ALI SHAYANFAR can be reached at (571) 270-1050. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/AMARE F TABOR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2434
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