Ex Parte THOMPSON

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Apr 29, 2019

14706968 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Apr. 29, 2019)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
14/706,968 05/08/2015
136187 7590 04/30/2019
AIO NETWORKS c/o Murabito, Hao & Barnes
111 North Market Street
Suite
san Jose, CA 95113
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Micheal THOMPSON
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.
ATEN-0006-02.02US 8577
EXAMINER
SHAIFER HARRIMAN, DANT B
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2434
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
04/30/2019 PAPER
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.
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte MICHEAL THOMPSON1
Appeal 2018-006798
Application 14/706,968
Technology Center 2400
Before CAROLYN D. THOMAS, JOSEPH P. LENTIVECH, and
SCOTT RAEVSKY, Administrative Patent Judges.
RAEVSKY, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant seeks our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner's final rejection of claims 1-20, all the pending claims in the
present application (see Claims Appendix). We have jurisdiction over the
appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM-IN-PART.
1 Appellant names A 10 Networks, Incorporated as the real party in interest
(App. Br. 1 ).
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Appeal 2018-006798
Application 14/706,968
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant's invention generally relates to client profile and service
policy based captcha techniques. See Abstract. Claim 1, reproduced below,
is illustrative of the claimed subject matter:
1. A method comprising:
receiving, by a service gateway, a service request from a
client device;
extracting, by the service gateway, client information from
the received service request;
selecting, by the service gateway, a captcha based upon
the client information and a client policy in response to the
service request;
generating, by the service gateway, captcha instructions
for the determined captcha;
generating, by the service gateway, an expected captcha
response for the determined captcha;
sending, by the service gateway, the captcha instructions
to the client device;
receiving, by the service gateway, a captcha response from
the client device in response to the captcha instructions;
comparing, by the service gateway, the captcha response
to the expected captcha response to determine based on the
service policy if the client device is operating under control of a
user or operating autonomously; and
sending, by the service gateway, the service request to an
appropriate server device if the client device is operating under
control of a user,
wherein said service gateway communicatively couples
the client device to a server device.
App. Br. 71-72 (Claims Appendix).
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Appeal 2018-006798
Application 14/706,968
Appellant appeals the following rejections: 2
Claims 1-4, 6-9, 11-13, and 14-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103 as being unpatentable over Kim et al. (US 2014/0020067 Al, pub. Jan.
16, 2014) and Hu et al. (US 2012/0254971 Al, pub. Oct. 4, 2012); Final
Act. 39.
Claims 5, 10, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Kim, Hu, and Emigh et al. (US 8,112,483 Bl, iss. Feb. 7,
2012). Id. at 45-46.
Claim 19 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over
Kim, Hu, and Selitser et al. (US 8,863,267 B2, iss. Oct. 14, 2014). Id. at 48.
Claim 20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over
Kim, Hu, and Bayar et al. (US 9,055,557 Bl, iss. June 9, 2015). Id. at 49.
Appellant does not appeal the following rejections maintained by the
Examiner (App. Br. 12):
Claims 1-11 and 13 are provisionally rejected on the ground of
nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1-4, 8-12,
16, 18, and 19 of co-pending Application No. 14/706,963. Final Act. 25.
Claims 1, 4-6, 9, 11, and 13 are provisionally rejected on the ground
of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 4, 9,
11, 14, 19, and 20 of co-pending Application No. 14/706,972. Id. at 31.
We review the appealed rejections for error based upon the issues
identified by Appellant and in light of the arguments and evidence produced
thereon. Ex parte Frye, 94 USPQ2d 1072, 1075 (BPAI 2010) (precedential).
2 The Examiner withdrew the rejection of claims 1-13 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 101. See Final Act. 36; Ans. 3.
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Appeal 2018-006798
Application 14/706,968
ANALYSIS
Rejection under 35 U.S. C. § 103
Appellant contends Hu fails to teach or suggest claim l's "extracting,
by the service gateway, client information from the received service
request." App. Br. 52-53. Specifically, Appellant contends, "Hu teaches,
'[t]he token is a unique identifier generated by the CAPTCHA system'
[0048, emphasis added]. As the token is generated by the CAPTCHA
system (alleged 'service gateway'), the token is not and cannot be 'extracted
... from the received service request,' as recited." Id. at 52.
Fig. 2 of Hu, reproduced below, depicts an application model of Hu' s
CAPTCHA method:
,1-'-'-'-'-'-"',
lrrl
AS21
F •. . ., 1gure .s.·
CAPTCHA
System 20
Hu ,i 30. In Fig. 2, a user client 21 sends a web page request (1) to the
application server (AS 22), which sends a CAPTCHA request (2) to the
CAPTCHA system 20. Id. ,i 59. In response, the CAPTCHA system
obtains an ad (3) and sends the ad and a token (4) to the application server.
Id. "The token is a unique identifier generated by the CAPTCHA system to
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Appeal 2018-006798
Application 14/706,968
identify a whole interaction session ... established between the CAPTCHA
system, Application Server, and user client." Id. ,i 48.
The Examiner finds that Ru's CAPTCHA system teaches the claimed
"service gateway," that Ru's "token" teaches the claimed "client
information," and that Ru's client "web page request" teaches the claimed
"service request." Final Act. 41. However, we agree with Appellant that
Ru's token is generated by the CAPTCHA system, not extracted from the
client's web page request.
The Examiner's Answer responds,
What is important to note of HU, is that the captcha
system generates the token and captcha image based on
parameters of the series of requests and response to the user
client to the application server AS. In other words[,] ... one of
ordinary skill in the art would know that the generated token
and captcha image are unique to the user client, which makes
obvious appellant[']s "extracting client information from a
service request."
Ans. 27 (emphasis added). We disagree. Even if Ru's generated token is
"based on ... response to the user client" and "unique to the user client," as
the Examiner asserts, the Examiner points us to no disclosure in Hu that
teaches or suggests the CAPTCHA system extracts client information to
generate the token. Instead, Hu teaches, "the token comprises an
advertisement ID number searched from a database ... based on the
category information in the [application server's] request." Id. ,i 48. This
category information indicates "classification of the application service
provided by the application server." Id. ,i 44. In other words, Ru's
CAPTCHA system generates the token using category information about the
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Appeal 2018-006798
Application 14/706,968
application server, not using extracted client information from the client's
web page request.
Moreover, Hu' s user client sends its web page request to the
application server, not the CAPTCHA system, as Appellants correctly assert.
See Hu ,-J 59; App. Br. 50. Thus, it is not apparent how Ru's CAPTCHA
system could extract any information from the client's request. Appellants
accordingly persuade us that the Examiner erred in finding Ru's CAPTCHA
system extracts client information from a received service request.
We note the Examiner has not relied on any of the other cited
references to teach this element. Accordingly, we do not sustain the
Examiner's rejection of claim 1 and its corresponding dependent claims.
Similarly, each of independent claims 6 and 14 recites substantially identical
language to the above-quoted limitation of claim 1. Accordingly, we also do
not sustain the Examiner's rejections of claims 6 and 14 and their
corresponding dependent claims.
We do not reach Appellant's further allegations of error because we
find the issue discussed above to be dispositive of the rejection of all the
pending claims.
Provisional Double Patenting Rejection
Appellant does not appeal the Examiner's provisional double
patenting rejections. App. Br. 12; see Final Act. 25, 31.
Provisional rejections, like all other rejections, are ripe for appeal
when an Appellant's claims have been twice rejected. See 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.3 l(a) (2011). A rejection not appealed will not be considered and is
subject to summary affirmance. 37 C.F.R. § 41.3l(c); Hyattv. Dudas, 551
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Appeal 2018-006798
Application 14/706,968
F.3d 1307, 1314 (Fed. Cir. 2008) (Board may affirm uncontested rejection
without considering the merits); see Ex parte Ghuman, 88 USPQ2d 1478,
1480 (BP AI 2008) (precedential).
Accordingly, we summarily affirm the Examiner's provisional double
patenting rejections. See Frye, 94 USPQ2d at 1075 (The Board "reviews ...
rejection[ s] for error based upon the issues identified by appellant, and in
light of the arguments and evidence produced thereon," and treats arguments
not made as waived.).
DECISION
We reverse the Examiner's§ 103 rejections of claims 1-20.
We summarily affirm the Examiner's provisional double patenting
rejections of claims 1-11 and 13.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § l .136(a)(l )(iv).
AFFIRMED-IN-PART
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