Appeal 2007-0644
Application 10/081,500
citation to any authority or other evidence, that a “spoiler” consisting of “1”
bits would provide inadequate security. We reject Appellant’s unfounded
allegation, without more. In accordance with the teachings of Hara (and in
accordance with instant claim 1), the additional bit sequence is encrypted,
along with the message portion of the datagram (e.g., the challenge bit
sequence), prior to transmission. After encryption, the bits residing in the
original bit positions of the padding (or spoiler) would not likely be identical
to the bits before the encryption, contrary to the apparent premise of
Appellant’s argument.
Even were we to accept the premise that a “spoiler” consisting of “1”
bits would provide less security than that intended by Appellant, Appellant
does not argue that a spoiler consisting of “1” bits would render the claimed
invention inoperative. At best, Appellant argues that such a spoiler would
compromise system security to some extent when compared with, for
example, a spoiler consisting of a random sequence of bits. However,
instant claim 1 does not, by its terms, distinguish over a spoiler consisting of
bits such as those taught by Hara. Nor does the claim provide any other
indication of how system security may be either strengthened or
compromised by selection of a spoiler bit sequence. For example, the claim
is not as specific as the “some embodiments” argued at page 3 of the Reply
Brief, where the spoiler value must be shared with another user for the
purposes of decrypting a communication. That a better selection of bits for a
spoiler might be indicated than the sequence taught by Hara is simply not
material, in view of the broad scope of the claim. “What matters is the
objective reach of the claim. If the claim extends to what is obvious, it is
4
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next
Last modified: September 9, 2013