Amos HACMUN et al.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Apr 28, 2021

2021000011 (P.T.A.B. Apr. 28, 2021)

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.
15/172,198 06/03/2016 Amos HACMUN HHLW P0659 6997
122066 7590 04/28/2021
M&B IP Analysts, LLC
150 Morristown Road
Suite 205
Bernardsville, NJ 07924-2626
EXAMINER
KWONG, CHO YIU
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
3698
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
04/28/2021 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):
eofficeaction@appcoll.com
pair@mb-ip.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte AMOS HACMUN and DOR HESKIA

Appeal 2021-000011
Application 15/172,198
Technology Center 3600
____________

Before RICHARD M. LEBOVITZ, ROBERT A. POLLOCK, and
JAMIE T. WISZ, Administrative Patent Judges.

LEBOVITZ, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
The Examiner rejected the claims under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as lacking
patent eligibility. Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from
the Examiner’s decision to reject the claims. We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM.

1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37
C.F.R. § 1.42. Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Amos
Hacmun and Dor Heskia. Appeal Br. 3.
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
There are three independent claims on appeal, claim 1, 13, and 14.
Claim 1 is directed to a method; claim 13 is directed to a non-transitory
computer readable medium having instructions for carrying out the same
method recited in claim 1; claim 14 is directed to a system for carrying out
the method recited in claim 1.
The Examiner rejected claims 1–24 in the Non-Final Office Action
under 35 U.S.C. § 101 “because the claimed invention is directed to a
judicial exception . . . without significantly more.” Non-Final Act. 2–3.
Appellant did not provide separate arguments for the claims. Claim 1
is therefore selected as representative to decide all the issues on appeal.
Claim 1 is copied below with numbered annotations added to refer to the
limitations in the claim:
1. A method performed by a computer system coupled to a
network for approval of an electronic payment by a credit
clearing device (CCD) comprising:
[1] receiving, by the computer system, via the network, a
first notification based on a payment card used to attempt a
financial transaction from the CCD, the first notification
containing information [1a] based on the payment card and [1b]
the attempted financial transaction;
[2] determining, by the computer system, whether the
financial transaction requires an external authorization based on
at least an analysis of at least a portion of the information
contained in the first notification;
[3] upon determination that an external authorization is
required,
[4] identifying, by the computer system, a plurality of
user devices that are indicated to have authorization authority
with regard to the attempted financial transaction, [4a] at least
two of the plurality of user devices each being associated with a
respective different user;
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[5] sending, by the computer system, over the network a
second notification to at least one user device of the at least two
user devices of the plurality of user devices; and
[6] sending, by the computer system, over the network a
third notification to the CCD based on a response of the at least
one user device, wherein the response is any one of:
[6a] an express approval of the attempted financial
transaction, [6b] an express denial of the attempted financial
transaction, and [6c] a failure to reply.

PATENT ELIGIBILITY
Principles of Law
Under 35 U.S.C. § 101, an invention is patent-eligible if it claims a
“new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter.”
However, not every discovery is eligible for patent protection. Diamond v.
Diehr, 450 U.S. 175, 185 (1981). “Excluded from such patent protection are
laws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas.” Id. The Supreme
Court articulated a two-step analysis to determine whether a claim falls
within an excluded category of invention. Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank
Int’l, 573 U.S. 208 (2014); Mayo Collaborative Servs. v. Prometheus Labs.,
Inc., 566 U.S. 66, 75–77 (2012).
In the first step, it is determined “whether the claims at issue are
directed to one of those patent-ineligible concepts.” Alice, 573 U.S. at 217. If
it is determined that the claims are directed to an ineligible concept, then the
second step of the two-part analysis is applied in which it is asked “[w]hat
else is there in the claims before us?” Id. (alteration in original) (citation and
quotation marks omitted). The Court explained that this step involves:
a search for an “‘inventive concept’”—i.e., an element or
combination of elements that is “sufficient to ensure that the
patent in practice amounts to significantly more than a patent
upon the [ineligible concept] itself.”
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Alice, 573 U.S. at 217–18 (alteration in original) (citing from Mayo, 566
U.S. at 75–77).
Alice, relying on the analysis in Mayo of a claim directed to a law of
nature, stated that in the second part of the analysis, “the elements of each
claim both individually and ‘as an ordered combination’” must be
considered “to determine whether the additional elements ‘transform the
nature of the claim’ into a patent-eligible application.” Alice, 573 U.S. at 217
(citation omitted).
The PTO published revised guidance on the application of 35 U.S.C.
§ 101, USPTO’s January 7, 2019 Memorandum, 2019 Revised Patent
Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 50 (Jan. 7, 2019)
(“Eligibility Guidance”) (we cite to the Federal Register where the
Eligibility Guidance was published). This guidance provides additional
direction on how to implement the two-part analysis of Mayo and Alice.
Step 2A, Prong One, of the Eligibility Guidance looks at the specific
limitations in the claim to determine whether the claim recites a judicial
exception to patent eligibility. In Step 2A, Prong Two, the claims are
examined to identify whether there are additional elements in the claims that
integrate the exception in a practical application, namely, is there a
“meaningful limit on the judicial exception, such that the claim is more than
a drafting effort designed to monopolize the judicial exception.” Eligibility
Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. (Step 2A, Prong Two).
If the claim recites a judicial exception that is not integrated into a
practical application, then as in the Mayo/Alice framework, Step 2B of the
Eligibility Guidance instructs us to determine whether there is a claimed
“inventive concept” to ensure that the claims define an invention that is
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significantly more than the ineligible concept itself. Eligibility Guidance, 84
Fed. Reg. 56.
With these guiding principles in mind, we proceed to determine
whether the claimed subject matter in this appeal is eligible for patent
protection under 35 U.S.C. § 101.

Discussion
Claim 1 is directed to a method for approval of an electronic payment
by a credit clearing device. A method is a “process,” which is one of the
broad statutory categories of patent-eligible subject matter listed in 35
U.S.C. § 101. Therefore, following the first step of the Mayo/Alice analysis,
we find that the claim is directed to a statutory class of invention. We thus
proceed to Step 2A, Prong One, of the 2019 Eligibility Guidance.

Step 2A, Prong One
In Step 2A, Prong One, of the Eligibility Guidance, the specific
limitations in the claim are examined to determine whether the claim recites
a judicial exception to patent eligibility, namely, whether the claim recites an
abstract idea, law of nature, or natural phenomenon. The Eligibility
Guidance directs each limitation in the claim to be examined to determine
whether it recites an abstract idea. 84 Fed. Reg. 54.
The Examiner found that the notifications (steps [1], [5], [6]), external
authorization (step [2]), and device identification (step [4]) steps recited in
claim 1 could be performed manually by a person. Non-Final Act. 5–6. The
Examiner also found that the claims cover the commercial interaction of
processing a transaction authorization, which the Examiner identified as
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certain methods of organizing human activity, a category of abstract ideas
recognized by the courts as an abstract idea and listed as such in the
Eligibility Guidance. Id. at 6–7.
The Examiner’s determination is in accord with the Eligibility
Guidance.
The claimed method is for approving an electronic payment by a
credit clearing device (“CCD”). The Specification provides no guidance on
what is a CCD, but because it is claimed as a device, we interpret it to mean
any device from which a party seeks credit from to complete a financial
transaction, such as credit card reader terminal or an automatic bank teller
machine.
In the first step [1] of the claim, a “first notification” is received when
a financial transaction is attempted. We understand this to mean, for
example, that a credit card is inserted into a credit card reader or automatic
bank teller. The notification is received by a “computer system” over a
network. The notification contains payment card information and the
attempted transaction. Thus, this step of the claim can be characterized as
data gathering because the computer system is gathering data or information
about the transaction.
It is determined in the second step [2] of the claim whether the
financial transaction requires an external authorization. This determination is
based on the information gathered in step [1], but the claim does not explain
how the determination to seek external authorization is made.
Upon determining that external authorization is required, the
computer system in step [4] identifies a plurality of user devices that are
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indicated to have authorization authority for the transaction. The devices are
associated with different users.
A second notification is then sent by the computer system in step [5]
to one of the user devices. The next step [6] of the claim sends a third
notification to the CCD device based on the response by the user device. The
response is “any one of: [6a] an express approval of the attempted financial
transaction, [6b] an express denial of the attempted financial transaction, and
[6c] a failure to reply.”
The content of the second and third notifications is not recited in the
claim. However, based on the claim as a whole, we understand that the
second notification is to notify the user of the attempted financial transaction
and request approval or denial of the transaction, and that the third
notification is to inform the CCD of the user’s response, letting the CCD
know whether the transaction has been approved.
We consider steps [1]–[6] of the claim to define the abstract idea
because each of these steps are integral to obtaining approval or denial of the
financial transaction.
Appellant argues that “the claims are not directed to commercial
interactions or managing personal behavior or relationships or interactions
between people. People do not interact in the claimed method, only
computers and mobile devices. Indeed, there is no action actually required
by any person per the claimed method.” Appeal Br. 10–11.
This argument does not persuade us that the Examiner erred in
determining that the claim recites a method of organizing human activity.
Appellant provides no evidence from either the Eligibility Guidance or court
cases that an actual human actor must participate in the claim for it be
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classified as a method of organizing human activity, nor do we discern any.
Rather, a claim can recite a method of organizing human activity when the
claim is performed for the benefit of a human. In Bozeman Financial LLC v.
Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, 955 F.3d 971 (Fed. Cir. 2020), the court
found a method for detecting fraud in financial transactions during a
payment clearing process to be patent-ineligible. The claim comprised
receiving records of electronic financial transactions, determining matches
between parameters in records, and sending notifications, none of which
steps required a human. Id. Despite the absence of a human actor, the court
found the claim to be patent-ineligible because it represented “a long-
standing commercial practice” of “verifying a transaction to avoid fraud.
Bozeman, 955 F.3d at 979. The claim here is also for avoiding fraudulent
transactions, the same type of long-standing commercial practice described
in Bozeman to be patent-ineligible. The rejected claim also comprises similar
steps to the claim in Bozeman.
Moreover, Appellant’s argument that “there is no action actually
required by any person per the claimed method” is incorrect because the
claim sends a notification to a user device (step [5]) and receives a response
from the user device (step [6]); these steps clearly encompass a human user
of the device receiving the notification and sending a response to it.
Consequently, for the foregoing reasons, we are unpersuaded by
Appellant’s arguments that the Examiner erred in finding that the claim
recites the abstract idea of certain methods of organizing human activity.
Because we find that the Examiner properly found that claim 1 recites
an abstract idea, we proceed to the next step in the analysis of determining
whether the abstract idea is integrated into a practical application.
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Step 2A, Prong Two
Prong Two of Step 2A under the Eligibility Guidance asks whether
there are additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical
application. We must look at the claim elements individually and “as an
ordered combination” to determine whether the additional elements integrate
the recited abstract idea into a practical application. As explained in the
Eligibility Guidance, integration may be found when an additional element
“reflects an improvement in the functioning of a computer, or an
improvement to other technology or technical field” or “applies or uses the
judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking
the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment,
such that the claim as a whole is more than a drafting effort designed to
monopolize the exception.” Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 55.
Appellant states that “the claims provide for an improvement in the
functioning of computer system and other technology as used to authorize
financial transactions and apply any judicial exception to effect improved
operation by preventing fraud in an automated manner.” Appeal Br. 9.
Appellant argues that the computer is used to provide “security” by
protecting against “granting improper access” which “overcomes a
technological problem with computers.” Id. at 9–10. Appellant further states
that the claims “make the computer system overall more secure, prevents
fraudulent computer access, improves computer security, and reduces
trouble for all the users of the computer system, and so they are directed to
allowable subject matter.” Id. at 10. Appellant contends that “the individual
claim elements are ‘integrated into a practical application’ in that any
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calculation/determination is not the end result but rather is used for
subsequent steps so as to reduce the likelihood of a transaction being
fraudulent or to otherwise insure that a payment card being used for a
transaction is properly being so used.” Id. at 11. Appellants cites a number
of Federal Circuit cases in which patent-eligibility of claims was decided,
stating that, similarly, the rejected claims here “involve a concrete way of
solving a technical problem presented by use of computer technology.” Id. at
12. Similar arguments are made throughout the Appeal Brief:
Here the claims clearly solve problems identified in the
background of the instant application with computers and
networks. Computers simply have many problems related to
security. Such have been revealed lately by the various large
scale data breaches reported in the news on what seems like a
regular basis.
Appeal Br. 12.

However, the instant application the differences between the
claims and the prior art reflect a technology-specific problem
and solution. Indeed, the method as now claimed is narrowly
tailored and rooted in computer technology. In particular, it
improves the computer system by reducing the possibility of
fraudulent misuse of the computer system.
Appeal Br. 13.

The Examiner states that the claimed invention at best provided
an improved transaction authorization method. However, even
if the invention as claimed was so limited, arguendo, which
Appellants are not admitting, such is achieved through proper
technical means integrated into a practical application much the
same way as improved software improves a computer system
by being a better series of steps that are performed to achieve a
desired goal.
Appeal Br. 13–14.

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Appellants’ claims, like those in Enfish, are directed to a
specific implementation of a solution in the computer art,
namely preventing unauthorized use of payment card when
such cards are used for payment via computers and networks.
This belies the Examiner’s comments in the Response to
Arguments and, as such, Appellants’ claims do not recite
abstract an idea for the same reasons that the claims in Enfish
did not recite an abstract idea.
Appeal Br. 18.
Appellant also complains that the Examiner’s analysis is not proper
and has not looked at the claims as a whole. Appeal Br. 17.
Missing from Appellant’s argument, and discussions of various
Federal Circuit cases involving patent-eligibility, is an identification of the
actual steps in the rejected claim that integrate the judicial exception into a
practical application. Appellant, as indicated above, states the claim
improves the computer system, solves a problem with the unauthorized use
of a credit card, and provides a specific implementation. But Appellant does
not point to the specific limitations in the claim that provide the
advancement and technical solution asserted by Appellant. To the contrary,
Appellant’s argument is stated in vague generalities, directing criticisms at
the Examiner for not engaging the claim as a whole, but failing to explain
the specific steps in the claim which provide the asserted technical solution.
We are aware of all the cases discussed in Appellant’s brief and the
general eligibility guidance explained to us by Appellant. For example,
Appellant refers to Enfish, LLC v. Microsoft Corp., 822 F.3d 1327 (Fed. Cir.
2016), (Appeal Br. 12, 17), Core Wireless Licensing S.A.R.L. v. LG
Electronics, Inc., 880 F.3d 1356 (Fed Cir. 2018) (Appeal Br. 12), and
BASCOM Glob. Internet Servs. v. AT&T Mobility LLC, 827 F.3d 1341(Fed.
Cir. 2016) (Appeal Br. 13) as cases which dictate that their own claims be
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found patent-eligible. In each of these cases cited by Appellant, patent-
eligibility was found because the claim contained elements beyond the
judicial exception which were deemed sufficient to provide patent eligible
improvement.
In Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1339, the claims were found to recite patent
eligible subject matter because “the self-referential table recited in the
claims on appeal is a specific type of data structure designed to improve the
way a computer stores and retrieves data in memory.”
The court in Core Wireless, 880 F.3d at 1359, 1362–1363, determined
that a claim directed to a computing device comprising a display screen
“configured to display on the screen a menu listing one or more
applications” and “to display on the screen an application summary that can
be reached directly from the menu” was patent-eligible because the claim
“restrains the type of data that can be displayed in the summary window”
and specified “a particular manner by which the summary window must be
accessed.”2 Further, the court found that claim improved the “efficiency of
using the electronic device by bringing together ‘a limited list of common
functions and commonly accessed stored data,’ which can be accessed
directly from the main menu.” Id. at 1363.

2 Core Wireless, 880 F.3d at 1359: “the computing device being configured
to display on the screen a menu listing one or more applications, and
additionally being configured to display on the screen an application
summary that can be reached directly from the menu, wherein the
application summary displays a limited list of data offered within the one or
more applications, each of the data in the list being selectable to launch the
respective application and enable the selected data to be seen within the
respective application, and wherein the application summary is displayed
while the one or more applications are in an un-launched state.”
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In BASCOM, 827 F.3d at 1350, the claimed subject matter was patent-
eligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101 because the claims were found to “carve out a
specific location for the filtering system (a remote ISP server) and require
the filtering system to give users the ability to customize filtering for their
individual network accounts.” Bascom, 827 F.3d at 1351. The court stated
that while filtering content was “already a known concept,” the claims
“recite a specific, discrete implementation of the abstract idea of filtering
content.” Id. at 1350.
In each of these cases, as recognized by Appellant (Appeal Br. 12),
the court examined the specific limitations in the claim to determine if there
was a limitation beyond the judicial exception which provided a basis for
patent eligibility. In contrast, here, Appellant has not identified any
limitation in the claim that makes the abstract idea patent-eligible under
Section 101, but rather characterizes the claimed invention in generalities
without reference to a specific limitation in the claim. Thus, we find
Appellant’s arguments inadequate to distinguish any of the cases cited in
their brief nor the eligibility principles described therein.
Appellant contends that “the invention as claimed is directed to steps
that are not how humans would or have organized their commercial activity
amongst themselves. Rather, such activity would be organized very
differently. As such, it is clear that the invention is directed solely to a
technological problem in the realm of computers and networks that people
do not and would not perform.” Appeal Br. 15.
The issue is not whether the steps are organized differently from how
a human would have organized the activity. That issue might be relevant to a
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determination as to whether the claims are new and unobvious,3 but that is
not the test for patent eligibility. As explained in Synopsys, Inc. v. Mentor
Graphics Corp., 839 F.3d 1138, 1151 (Fed. Cir. 2016), “a claim for a new
abstract idea is still an abstract idea” and the steps recited in claim 1 are
directed to the abstract idea of organizing human activity.
The issue is also not whether the claim is accomplished on a
computer. Performing steps on a generic computer, without improving the
computer functionality, is not sufficient to confer patent eligibility on a
claim. In re Abel, 838 Fed.Appx. 558, 562 (Fed. Cir. 2021) (non-
precedential) (“The abstract idea itself encompasses most of what is found in
claim 1. What remains is merely implementation on conventional
computers.”); NetSoc, LLC v. Match Group, LLC, 838 Fed.Appx. 544, 549
(Fed. Cir. 2020) (non-precedential) (“The claim limitations fail to add a
technological improvement to the computer or otherwise provide ‘something
more’ to ‘transform’ the claims. See [Alice] at 217, 134 S.Ct. 2347. Rather,
the ’107 patent claims are quintessential ‘apply it with a computer’ claims.
See id. at 223, 134 S.Ct. 2347 (‘Stating an abstract idea while adding the
words ‘apply it with a computer’ simply combines those two steps, with the

3 “Maritz also argues that the claims are eligible under § 101 because they
recite novel and nonobvious subject matter. . . . However, even if ‘[w]e may
assume that the techniques claimed are ‘[g]roundbreaking, innovative, or
even brilliant,’ ... that is not enough for eligibility.” See, e.g., SAP Am., Inc.
v. InvestPic, LLC, 898 F.3d 1161, 1163 (Fed. Cir. 2018) (quoting Ass’n for
Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc., 569 U.S. 576, 591, 133 S.Ct.
2107, 186 L.Ed.2d 124 (2013)); see also id. (concluding that it is not
‘enough for subject-matter eligibility that claimed techniques be novel and
nonobvious in light of prior art’).” cxLoyalty, Inc. v. Maritz Holdings Inc.,
986 F.3d 1367, 1378 (Fed. Cir. 2021).
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same deficient result.’).)” Appellant has not established the claimed method
results in an improvement in computer functionality.
The steps recited in claim 1 are patent-ineligible because they are
stated in a “result-oriented way,” in which the desired result of the step is
recited, without explaining how the result is accomplished. For example,
step [2] recites “determining, by the computer system, whether the financial
transaction requires an external authorization based on at least an analysis of
at least a portion of the information contained in the first notification,” but
there is no recitation as to how this determination is made. As explained in
Dropbox, Inc. v. Synchronoss Technologies, Inc., 815 Fed.Appx. 529, 533
(Fed. Cir. 2020) (nonprecedential):
The patent has to describe how to solve the problem in a
manner that encompasses something more than the “principle in
the abstract.” See [ChargePoint, Inc. v. SemaConnect, Inc., 920
F.3d 759, 769 (Fed. Cir. 2019)] (explaining that an invention
may not be patent eligible if the “claims ‘were drafted in such a
result-oriented way that they amounted to encompassing the
‘principle in the abstract’ no matter how implemented’”
(quoting Interval Licensing LLC v. AOL, Inc., 896 F.3d 1335,
1343 (Fed. Cir. 2018))).
Dropbox, 815 Fed.Appx. at 533.
Because we find that the abstract idea is not integrated into a practical
application under Step 2, Prong Two, we proceed to Step 2B of the analysis.

Step 2B
Step 2B of the Eligibility Guidance asks whether there is an inventive
concept. In making this Step 2B determination, we must consider whether
there are specific limitations or elements recited in the claim “that are not
well-understood, routine, conventional activity in the field, which is
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indicative that an inventive concept may be present” or whether the claim
“simply appends well-understood, routine, conventional activities previously
known to the industry, specified at a high level of generality, to the judicial
exception, indicative that an inventive concept may not be present.” 84 Fed.
Reg. 56 (footnote omitted).
Appellant has not provided evidence that the elements beyond the
judicial exception, such as the computer system, the network, the CCD, and
the user devices are arranged in a unique and inventive way. Rather, these
elements appear to be performing their functions generically and
conventionally for what they were designed to do. Consistently, the
Specification states that the “various embodiments may be implemented as
hardware, firmware, software, or any combination thereof,” and cites
conventional hardware to do so. Spec. ¶ 32.
Because Appellant has not provide adequate evidence of a non-
conventional and inventive arrangement of the elements in the claim beyond
the judicial exception, we are compelled to affirm the rejection of claim 1 as
patent-ineligible. Claims 2–24 are not argued separately and fall with claim
1. 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).

CONCLUSION
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–24 101 Eligibility 1–24

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TIME PERIOD
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED