Ex Parte Haverinen et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardAug 13, 2014

10659774 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 13, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________________ Ex parte HENRY HAVERINEN and KALLE AHMAVAARA ____________________ Appeal 2012-003681 Application 10/659,774 Technology Center 2400 ____________________ Before: JOHN C. KERINS, MICHAEL L. HOELTER, and JAMES P. CALVE, Administrative Patent Judges. CALVE, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from the rejection of claims 1, 4, 7, 10, 13–15, 20, 21, and 24–29. App. Br. 2. Claims 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, 12, 16–19, 22, and 23 are cancelled. See Amendment filed August 15, 2008. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We REVERSE. Appeal 2012-003681 Application 10/659,774 2 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER Claims 1, 4, 7, 10, 13, 15, 20, 27, and 29 are independent. Claim 1 is reproduced below. 1. A method, comprising: receiving a request for full authentication of a terminal; transmitting to the terminal a reauthentication identity including a unique realm name uniquely identifying an authentication server in response to the request for full authentication; and receiving a request for reauthentication from the terminal, the request for reauthentication including the reauthentication identity including the unique realm name uniquely identifying the authentication server; wherein the request for reauthentication is routed to the authentication server according to the unique realm name included in the request for reauthentication. REJECTIONS Claims 1, 4, 7, 10, 13–15, 20, 21, and 24–29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over O’Neill (US 2003/0176188 A1; pub. Sep. 18, 2003) and Westerdal (US 2002/0133719 A1; pub. Sep. 19, 2002). Claims 14 and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over O’Neill, Westerdal, and Barriga-Caceres (US. 2003/0163733 A1; pub. Aug. 28, 2003). ANALYSIS Claims 1, 4, 7, 10, 13–15, 20, 21, and 24–29 unpatentable over O’Neill and Westerdal Claims 1, 4, 7, 13, 15, 20, 21, 24–26 The Examiner found that O’Neill discloses the method of claim 1 including transmitting a request for full authentication of a terminal (para. Appeal 2012-003681 Application 10/659,774 3 31, lines 1-8) and transmitting to the terminal a reauthentication identity including a unique realm name uniquely identifying an authentication server in response to the request for full authentication (para. 53, lines 13-17). Ans. 5-6, 11. The Examiner found that a skilled artisan would understand that the mobile node at some point in the authentication/reauthentication process with the home Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting (“AAA”) server will receive that server’s identity and reasoned that a mobile node must be aware if its home AAA server that already has authenticated the mobile device and therefore the mobile device receive a reauthentication identity with a unique realm name uniquely identifying the authentication server. Ans. 11–12. The Examiner found that O’Neill does not disclose transmitting to the terminal a reauthentication identity in response to the request for full authentication but Westerdal discloses this feature at paragraphs 36 and 37. Ans. 6–7. The Examiner rejected claims 4, 7, 13, 15, and 20 on the same findings. Ans. 7. Appellants argue that O’Neill only discloses that a terminal (mobile node) may send an identity to the network because message 550 is directed to a Remote Home Agent 112 but the identity is sent first to access router 128 as message 550a and then to a remote home agent 112 as message 550b. App. Br. 5 (citing O’Neill, para. 53). Appellants also argue that the message 550 includes a network access identifier that has a user part and a realm part, but message 550 is sent to Remote Home Agent 112 and is not transmitted to, or received by, the terminal node. Id. Appellants further argue that the Examiner has not shown that this feature is necessarily present or inherent in O’Neill because “other possibilities may exist as to how a mobile node is Appeal 2012-003681 Application 10/659,774 4 supplied with the realm part identifying the home service, e.g., during initial programming by a manufacturer.” Reply Br. 2. We agree. The Examiner has not established by a preponderance of evidence that O’Neill discloses transmitting to the terminal a reauthentication identity including a unique realm name uniquely identifying an authentication server in response to the request for full authentication. O’Neill discloses that end node 1, which the Examiner treats as a terminal (see Ans. 5), sends a message 550 that includes a network access identifier with a user part and a realm part that identifies a home AAA server. O’Neill, para. 53; Fig. 5. Message 550 is sent to access router 128 as message 550a and then is sent to remote home agent 112 as message 550b. Id. The Examiner has not identified any express disclosure of reauthentication identify or unique realm part being transmitted to, or received by, end node 1. Nor has the Examiner established that this feature is disclosed inherently in O’Neill. See In re Robertson, 169 F.3d 743, 745 (Fed. Cir. 1999) (“Inherency . . . may not be established by probabilities or possibilities. The mere fact that a certain thing may result from a given set of circumstances is not sufficient.”) (citation omitted). The Examiner’s reliance on Westerdal to disclose transmission of a reauthentication identity to a terminal in response to a specific request (Ans. 6–7, 12, 13) does not remedy this deficiency because Westerdal discloses the use of an authentication server identifier (APID) 124 that is used to identify a client 102 to an authentication server 112. Although Westerdal discloses that an authentication server 112 generates and sends an APID 124 to a client 102, the APID 124 becomes part of a cookie 107 that the client 102 sends to the authentication server 112 to identify the client 102 to a server Appeal 2012-003681 Application 10/659,774 5 110. Westerdal, paras. 36–37. The Examiner has not explained adequately or otherwise established that providing an APID 124 to a client 102, which Westerdal discloses as being used to identify the client 102 to authentication server 112, also serves as a unique realm name that uniquely identifies an authentication server in response to a request for full authentication, as claimed. Appellants disclose that each AAA server is allocated a unique realm name such as for example “server.myoperator.com” and the unique realm names are used in reauthentication identities. Spec. 9, ll. 7–10; see also Spec. 8, ll. 13–23. As such, we do not sustain the rejection of claim 1, or claims 4, 7, 13, 15, 20, which the Examiner rejected on the same findings as claim 1 (Ans. 7) or claims 24–26, which depend from claim 4, or claim 21, which depends from claim 20. Claims 10 and 27–29 The Examiner rejected claims 10 and 27–29 on the grounds that O’Neill discloses a first authentication server configured to transmit to the terminal a reauthentication identity including a unique realm name uniquely identifying the first authentication server in response to the request for full authentication. Ans. 7–9. The Examiner relied on Westerdal to disclose transmitting a reauthentication identity to a terminal in response to an authentication request. Ans. 8–9. Appellants argue that these rejections are improper for the reasons discussed supra for claim 1. See App. Br. 6. We do not sustain the rejection of claims 10 and 27–29.1 1 We note that claim 27 recites “receiving from the first authentication server a reauthentication identity identity [sic] including a unique realm name uniquely indicating the first authentication server in response to the request for full authentication.” Claim 29 recites a computer program with “a computer readable storage structure embodying computer program code” Appeal 2012-003681 Application 10/659,774 6 Claims 14 and 21 unpatentable over O’Neill, Westerdal, and Barriga- Caceres The Examiner relied on Barriga-Caceres to disclose an identity response packet according to an Extensible Authentication Protocol as recited in claims 14 and not to remedy any deficiencies of O’Neill or Westerdal as to claims 13 and 20 from which claims 14 and 21 depend, respectively. Ans. 10. Accordingly, we do not sustain the rejection of claims 14 and 21. DECISION We REVERSE the rejections of claims 1, 4, 7, 10, 13–15, 20, 21, and 24–29. REVERSED llw that “includes instructions for performing a method according to claim 27.” Although neither claim 27 nor claim 29 recites that the reauthentication identity is received at a terminal, the Examiner rejected these claims on the same rationale as claim 10, which we do not sustain, and did not provide any other basis for rejecting these claims.