Ex Parte KennedyDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardDec 15, 201713030537 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 15, 2017) Copy Citation United States Patent and Trademark Office 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 APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 13/030,537 02/18/2011 Kevin J. Kennedy 4366-529 2903 48500 7590 12/19/2017 SHERIDAN ROSS P.C. 1560 BROADWAY, SUITE 1200 DENVER, CO 80202 EXAMINER SCHMIDT, KARIL ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2439 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/19/2017 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): cjacquet@ sheridanross.com pair_Avay a @ firsttofile. com edocket @ sheridanross .com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte KEVIN J. KENNEDY1 Appeal 2017-007621 Application 13/030,537 Technology Center 2400 Before DEBRA K. STEPHENS, DANIEL J. GALLIGAN, and DAVID J. CUTITTAII, Administrative Patent Judges. CUTITTAII, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a final rejection of claims 1—8, 10-12, 15—18, and 20-24, which are all of the claims pending in the application.2 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We REVERSE. 1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Avaya Inc. App. Br. 2. 2 Claims 9, 13, 14, and 19 are cancelled. Appeal 2017-007621 Application 13/030,537 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER According to Appellant, the claims are directed to a policy enforcement system that determines whether content can be shared with other parties. Spec. 5:17—19, 17:8—9, 39:6—11.3 Claim 1, reproduced below with line breaks added for clarity, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 1. A method, comprising: receiving, by a hardware microprocessor, in a first communication session, existing media content from a communication device of a first subscriber, wherein the first subscriber has privileged access to the existing media content; analyzing, by the hardware microprocessor, the existing media content in the first communication session to identity a behavior of a second subscriber relevant to a policy or rule, wherein the second subscriber has privileged access to the existing media content, wherein the existing media content of the first communication session is accessed by a communication device of the second subscriber, wherein the behavior is the communication device of the second subscriber receiving input attempting to make the existing media content in the first communication session accessible to one or more communication devices of one or more selected other parties in another communication session, 3 This Decision refers to: (1) Appellant’s Specification filed February 18, 2011 (Spec.); (2) the Final Office Action (Final Act.) mailed September 22, 2016; (3) the Advisory Action (Adv. Act.) mailed October 28, 2016; (4) the Appeal Brief (App. Br.) filed December 13, 2016; (5) the Examiner’s Answer (Ans.) mailed March 23, 2017; and (6) the Reply Brief (Reply Br.) filed April 21, 2017. 2 Appeal 2017-007621 Application 13/030,537 wherein at least one of the one or more selected other parties does not have privileged access to the existing media content; notifying, by the hardware microprocessor, a policy enforcement server of the identified determined behavior; and receiving, by the hardware microprocessor, and from the policy enforcement server, a policy measure to be implemented; and implementing, by the hardware processor, the received policy measure, wherein the implemented received policy measure is to deny the input attempting to make the existing media content in the first communication session accessible to the communication device of the at least one of the one or more selected other parties who does not have privileged access to the existing media content. REFERENCES AND REJECTIONS Claims 1 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Wong (US 2007/0183342 Al; published Aug. 9, 2007) and Haveson (US 2008/0066181 Al; published Mar. 13, 2008). Final Act. 3-7. Claims 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 11, 12, 15, 17, and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Wong, Haveson, and Kim (US 2008/0178001 Al; published July 24, 2008). Final Act. 7-13. Claim 4 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Wong, Haveson, Kim, and Bramson (US 2006/0047725 Al; published Mar. 2, 2006). Final Act. 14—15. Claims 7 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Wong, Haveson, Kim, and Van Riel (US 2009/0138506 Al; published May 28, 2009). Final Act. 15—16. 3 Appeal 2017-007621 Application 13/030,537 Claims 18 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Wong, Haveson, and Pragada (US 2007/0136397 Al; published June 14, 2007). Final Act. 17. Claims 21 and 244 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Wong, Haveson, Kim, and Pannu (US 2006/0248573 Al; published Nov. 2, 2006). Final Act. 18—20. Claim 23 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Wong, Haveson, Kim, and Lim (US 2008/0059474 Al; published Mar. 6, 2008). Final Act. 21. CONTENTIONS AND ANALYSIS Appellant disputes the Examiner’s factual findings regarding Wong. Namely, Appellant contends Wong does not teach analyzing, by the hardware microprocessor, the existing media content in the first communication session to identify a behavior of a second subscriber. . . wherein the behavior is the communication device of the second subscriber receiving input attempting to make the existing media content in the first communication session accessible to one or more communication devices of one or more selected other parties, as recited in claim 1. App. Br. 8; Reply Br. 4—6. Specifically, Appellant argues “[jjust because Wong discloses that the peer computer system 150 receives a video stream and provides the same video stream to the peer computer system 120 does not mean that the peer computer systems 120 or 150 actually analyze[] the content of the video stream to identify a 4 The Examiner includes a heading additionally rejecting claim 24 over the combination of Wong, Haveson, and Lim. Final Act. 22. However, the rejection that follows is directed to claim 23, not claim 24. We consider this a mere clerical error. 4 Appeal 2017-007621 Application 13/030,537 behavior.” Reply Br. 5; App. Br. 8. I.e., “in Wong, the media is just sent to a peer computer system based on [a] request.” App. Br. 8. We are persuaded. The Examiner finds (Ans. 2—3) Wong teaches a peer computer system 120 may receive content from the server system 110 and, in turn, provide it to another peer computer system 140 (Wong 114; see Wong 127, Fig. 1). The Examiner further finds (Ans. 3; Adv. Act. 2) Wong’s peer-to-peer sharing includes “streaming and downloading of DRM protected files” (Wong 115). Additionally, the Examiner finds Wong’s “client would permit content protected by DRM within a first stream to be restreamed to a requesting client (i.e., [the] request being the behavior) and thus the client would provide the stream to the requesting client based on policy or rules contained in the DRM of content within stream.” Ans. 4; Adv. Act. 2. We determine that, although Wong shares DRM-protected media content between peers, the Examiner has not shown how Wong teaches or suggests that the media content, or its DRM, is analyzed to identify an attempt to share the media content. Appellant highlights that the claim requires analyzing the media content itself to “identify a behavior of a second subscriber,” and specifically, a behavior of attempting to share that media content. App. Br. 8, 10; Reply Br. 5. Indeed, the claim recites “the behavior is the communication device of the second subscriber receiving input attempting to make the existing media content in the first communication session accessible to one or more communication devices of one or more selected other parties.” As such, the claim requires analyzing the media content itself to identity receiving input attempting to share that media content with another user. Wong, however, does not identity 5 Appeal 2017-007621 Application 13/030,537 receiving input attempting to share media content by analyzing the media content itself. See Wong || 14—15, 20-22, 27—28, Fig. 3. Namely, although Wong teaches encrypting media content using DRM (Wong 139) to share DRM-protected media content (Wong || 15, 35), Wong does not teach that the media content is analyzed to identify receiving input attempting to share that media content. Furthermore, although the Examiner finds Wong’s DRM content within a stream is analyzed, the Examiner does not establish that an analysis of DRM protections is an analysis of media content. See Ans. 4. Thus, the Examiner has not shown, or explained in sufficient detail, how Wong’s media content is used to identify receiving input attempting to share that media content. Additionally, the Examiner does not rely on Haveson to teach the disputed limitations. See Ans. 2-4; see also Adv. Act. 2; see also Final Act. 4—6. Accordingly, we do not sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claim 1 for these reasons. As Appellant discusses, independent claims 10 and 18 include the same requirements as independent claim 1 (App. Br. 11) and the Examiner rejects claims 10 and 18 for the same reasons as claim 1 (Final Act. 7, 17). In particular, claims 1,10, and 18 similarly require that the media content itself is examined in order to identify an attempt to share that media content. Claim 10 recites analyzing] the first communication session and the existing media content in the first communication session to identify a behavior . . . wherein the behavior is the communication device of the second subscriber receiving input attempting to make the existing media content in the first communication session accessible to one or more communication devices of one or more selected other parties in another communication session (emphases added). 6 Appeal 2017-007621 Application 13/030,537 Claim 18 recites searching], analyzing], or tag[ging] a received first communication session and existing media content in the first communication session to identify an actual or potential policy or rule violation. . . wherein the violation is the second subscriber communication device receiving input attempting to make the existing media content in the first communication session accessible to one or more communication devices of one or more selected other parties in another communication session. Claim 18 requires that media content is examined, i.e., “searche[d], analyze[d], or tag[ged],” to identify receiving input attempting to share that media content, i.e., “receiving input attempting to make the existing media content in the first communication session accessible to one or more communication devices of one or more selected other parties.” Accordingly, we also do not sustain the Examiner’s rejection of independent claims 10 and 18 for the reasons as claim 1. Because we agree with at least one of the arguments advanced by Appellant, we need not reach the merits of Appellant’s other arguments. See App. Br. 9—15. It follows that Appellant has shown that the Examiner erred in concluding that the combined teachings of Wong and Haveson render claims 1 and 10 unpatentable; the combined teachings of Wong, Haveson, and Kim render claims 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 11, 12, 15, 17, and 22 unpatentable; the combined teachings of Wong, Haveson, Kim, and Bramson render claim 4 unpatentable; the combined teachings of Wong, Haveson, Kim, and Van Riel render claims 7 and 16 unpatentable; the combined teachings of Wong, Haveson, and Pragada render claims 18 and 20 unpatentable; the combined teachings of Wong, Haveson, Kim, and Pannu render claims 21 and 24 unpatentable; and the combined teachings of Wong, Haveson, Kim, and Lim render claim 23 unpatentable. 7 Appeal 2017-007621 Application 13/030,537 DECISION For the reasons above, we reverse the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1—8, 10-12, 15—18, and 20—24. REVERSED 8 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation