Appeal No. 2000-1508 Page 9
Application No. 08/810,442
“Analysis begins with a key legal question -- what is the
invention claimed?” Panduit Corp. v. Dennison Mfg. Co., 810 F.2d
1561, 1567, 1 USPQ2d 1593, 1597 (Fed. Cir. 1987). Here, claim 10
recites in pertinent part the following limitations: “key (SK)
must be entered onto said bus in encrypted form to be accepted by
a computation means.” Accordingly, the limitations require
checking a key on a bus to determine whether the key is encrypted
before the key can be accepted.
The next question is whether the claimed invention is
enabled. Figure 8, cited by the appellant, “illustrates the
decryption process occurring at the customer’s site.” (Spec.
at 20.) In describing the decryption process, the appellant’s
specification merely mentions that “[k]ey SK is encrypted using
PK as a key, as indicated by phrase [sic] 56, and is decrypted in
block 23, using actual PK, on bus 63, to produce actual SK, on
bus 64.” (Spec. at 21.) The specification fails to mention, let
alone describe, checking a key on a bus to determine whether the
key is encrypted before the key can be accepted. Therefore, we
affirm the rejection of claim 10 as non-enabled.
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