PTAB

CBM2016-00021

Google Inc v. Zuili Patrick

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Key Events
Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Method for detecting fraudulent activity in a pay-per-click online advertising system
  • Brief Description: The ’667 patent discloses a method for identifying fraudulent clicks in an online pay-per-click environment. The method involves using a unique "code" to identify a client and then detecting fraudulent activity by measuring the duration between clicks made by that client.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over IAB Study - Claims 1-3, 10, 14, 18, 19, and 21 are obvious over the IAB Study.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: IAB Study (a 2002 publication from the Interactive Advertising Bureau on online ad measurement).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that the IAB Study, a single prior art reference, disclosed all limitations of the challenged claims. The study taught using a "Cookie-Based Method" to uniquely identify users in online advertising environments that included pay-per-click models and portal sites like Yahoo!. The study explicitly disclosed methods for filtering "robotic activity" by analyzing "Interaction attributes," defined as "consistent intervals between clicks or page/ad impression from a user." Petitioner contended this directly taught the ’667 patent's core concept of detecting fraud by measuring the duration between clicks associated with a unique identifier (the cookie). The IAB Study also disclosed the client-server interactions necessary to implement this tracking and filtering.
    • Motivation to Combine: As a single-reference ground, no motivation to combine was necessary. Petitioner argued the IAB Study itself rendered the claims obvious by describing the complete claimed method for the known purpose of improving online advertising metrics by filtering out fraudulent or robotic clicks.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Messer, AAPA, and Laurent - Claims 1-3, 6, 10, 14, 15, 18, 19, and 21 are obvious over Messer in view of AAPA and Laurent.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Messer (Patent 7,020,622), AAPA (Applicant Admitted Prior Art from the ’667 patent’s background section), and Laurent (a 1998 publication on cookies).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Messer taught the core inventive concept: detecting click fraud by using an identifier stored in a cookie to "measure[] the interval between successive clicks." However, Messer taught this in the context of affiliate banner ads, not a pay-per-click search engine. Petitioner asserted that AAPA supplied this missing element by admitting that pay-per-click search engines were well-known in the art before the ’667 patent’s filing date. Finally, Laurent was cited to provide the well-understood technical details of cookie functionality, such as how cookies containing identifiers and website information are transmitted between a client and server, which Petitioner argued Messer implicitly suggested.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Messer’s click fraud detection method with the well-known pay-per-click environment described in AAPA to improve the reliability and commercial viability of such systems, a known industry goal. Because Messer taught using cookies for tracking, a POSITA would naturally turn to a standard reference like Laurent to implement the conventional functionality of cookies for transmitting the necessary tracking data.
    • Expectation of Success: Petitioner contended the combination merely applied a known fraud-detection technique (Messer) to a known commercial environment (AAPA) using standard, well-documented web technology (Laurent). This combination of known elements for their intended purposes would have yielded only predictable results.

Ground 3: Ineligibility under §101 - Claims 1-3, 6, 10, 14, 15, 18, 19, and 21 are unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. §101.

  • Core Argument for this Ground:

    • Petitioner argued the claims were directed to the patent-ineligible abstract idea of "detecting fraud based on the time between two requests by the same client." This concept was characterized as a fundamental economic practice and a mental process that could be performed without a computer. The petition asserted that the claims lacked an "inventive concept" sufficient to transform the abstract idea into a patent-eligible application. Instead, the claims merely recited the abstract idea and instructed its application within a generic technological environment (a pay-per-click system) using conventional computer components (server, client, search engine) and routine data-gathering steps (generating and transmitting a "code"). The patent’s own specification admitted the invention could be implemented with non-novel hardware, further demonstrating the lack of a technological improvement over the prior art.

  • Additional Grounds: Petitioner asserted additional obviousness challenges, including combining the IAB Study with Laurent to explicitly add the teaching of Global Unique Identifiers (GUIDs) for claims 6 and 15.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

  • "code": Petitioner argued that the term "code" should be given its plain and ordinary meaning as "a series of letters, numbers, or other symbols to represent or identify something." This construction was asserted to be consistent with the specification and an agreement between the parties in related district court litigation. This broad construction supports the invalidity arguments by encompassing conventional identifiers like those stored in cookies, which were ubiquitous in the prior art.

5. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests institution of a Covered Business Method patent review and cancellation of claims 1-3, 6, 10, 14, 15, 18, 19, and 21 of the ’667 patent as unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. §§ 101 and 103.