Ex Parte RoyyuruDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardFeb 18, 201612641239 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 18, 2016) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR 12/641,239 12/17/2009 20350 7590 02/22/2016 KILPATRICK TOWNSEND & STOCKTON LLP TWO EMBARCADERO CENTER EIGHTH FLOOR SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94111-3834 Vijay Royyuru UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O. Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www .uspto.gov ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 020375-096600US 1232 EXAMINER ZELASKIEWICZ, CHRYSTINAE ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3621 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 02/22/2016 ELECTRONIC Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address( es): ipefiling@kilpatricktownsend.com j lhice@kilpatrick.foundationip.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte VIJA Y ROYYURU1 Appeal2013-009461 Application 12/641,239 Technology Center 3600 Before HUBERT C. LORIN, NINA L. MEDLOCK, and BRADLEY B. BAY AT, Administrative Patent Judges. BAY AT, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's final rejection of claims 1-18 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Dominguez2 and Ellmore. 3 See Final Action 2-9. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). "The present invention relates, in general, to financial account enrollment, and more particularly, to enrollment authentication using a partial account number (PAN)." Spec. i-f 2. Claims land 13 are 1 Appellant identifies the real party in interest as "First Data Corporation." Appeal Br. 3. 2 Dominguez et al., US 2010/0063895 Al, published March 11, 2010. 3 Ellmore, US 2007/0192618 Al, published August 16, 2007. Appeal2013-009461 Application 12/641,239 independent, and recite substantially similar subject matter. Representative claim 1 recites: 1. A method of implementing enrollment authentication, the method comprising: receiving, by a processing system from a customer, a partial primary account number (PAN) and an identifier of an issuing financial institution of the partial PAN; based on transaction history related to the partial PAN, presenting, from the processing system, a plurality of challenge questions to the customer; receiving, by the processing system from the customer, answers to the plurality of challenge questions; based on the partial PAN, the identifier of the issuing financial institution, and the answers to the plurality of challenge questions, resolving, by the processing system, a complete PAN; prompting the customer to select a mutual trust phrase; receiving, by the processing system, the selected mutual trust phrase; placing a call from an interactive voice response (IVR) system to the customer; playing back, by the IVR system to the customer, the selected mutual trust phrase; receiving, from a telephone, the customer's personal identification number (PIN) associated with the complete PAN; and using, by the processing system, the complete PAN and PIN combination to authenticate the customer. Appeal Br. 13, Claims Appendix. DISCUSSION Independent claim 1 requires, inter alia, "receiving ... a partial primary account number (PAN) and an identifier of an issuing financial institution of the partial PAN; based on transaction history related to the 2 Appeal2013-009461 Application 12/641,239 partial PAN, presenting, from the processing system, a plurality of challenge questions to the customer." Id. In maintaining the rejection of independent claim 1 as obvious over Dominguez and Ellmore, the Examiner relies on Dominguez at paragraphs 64 and 77 for disclosing the limitation based on transaction history related to the partial PAN, presenting, from the processing system, a plurality of challenge questions to the customer. Answer 3--4 (emphasis added); see also Final Action 3. Appellant challenges this finding, arguing the "hint question and response pair" in Dominguez, which the Examiner relies on, is not based on transaction history as required by claim 1. See Appeal Br. 7-8; Reply Br. 2. In responding to Appellant's argument, the Examiner cites paragraph 77 of Dominguez and reasons that "questions can be presented during a transaction due to failed attempts to enter a [correct] password," and thus, those questions are based on transaction history. Answer 4. Although Dominguez discloses presenting, from the processing system, a plurality of challenge questions to a customer to verify the customer's identity during authentication (Dominguez i-f 64), those challenge questions are not based on transaction history related to the partial PAN, as called for by claim 1. During examination, claims are to be given their broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with the specification, and the language should be read in light of the specification as it would be interpreted by one of ordinary skill in the art. In re Amer. Acad. of Sci. Tech Ctr., 367 F.3d 1359, 1364 (Fed. Cir. 2004) (citations omitted). Paragraph 77 of Dominguez discloses "[i]f the cardholder is unable to correctly enter the authentication password, then the cardholder can be prompted with the hint question that was established during the cardholder's registration process." 3 Appeal2013-009461 Application 12/641,239 Dominguez's challenge questions presented during the processing of a failed transaction are based on stored customer information such as social security number, driver's license number, billing address, email addresses, etc. See Dominguez i-f 65. Claim 1 requires presenting a plurality of challenge questions to the customer based on transaction history related to the received partial PAN. Appellant's Specification provides that upon receiving a partial PAN from the customer, a transaction repository database is searched to locate matching transactions associated with that PAN, and transaction history challenge questions are presented to the customer. Spec. i-f 15. By using historical data from previously authenticated transactions and posing them as challenge questions to the consumer, the correct owner of the PAN that conducted those transactions would therefore know the answers to those challenged questions. Id. at 16. In light of the Specification, we find the Examiner's interpretation of this disputed claim limitation to be unreasonably broad and inconsistent with the Specification. Dominquez's customer information (i.e., social security number, email address, driver's license number) stored during the enrollment process and used to verify the identity of a consumer during a failed transaction attempt is unrelated to transaction history, and the hint questions derived from that enrollment information are not based on historical transactions related to the received partial PAN. Dominguez thus fails to disclose that the challenge questions presented to the customer are "based on transaction history related to the partial PAN," as required by claim 1. As such, we do not sustain the rejection of independent claim 1. We also do not sustain the rejection of independent claim 13, which recites substantially similar subject matter, and was rejected based on the same 4 Appeal2013-009461 Application 12/641,239 erroneous finding. The Examiner does not rely on Ellmore to remedy this error. Therefore, for the same reasons, we do not sustain the rejection of claims 2-12 and 14--18, which depend either directly or indirectly from independent claims 1 and 13. DECISION The Examiner's decision to reject claims 1-18 is reversed. REVERSED 5 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation