Digital Data Remote Mirroring Patent Ineligible Under 35 U.S.C. § 101

​ The court granted defendant's motion for summary judgment of invalidity because the asserted claims of plaintiff’s digital data remote mirroring patent encompassed unpatentable subject matter and found that the claims were directed toward an abstract idea. "[Plaintiff] contends that the claimed invention is not directed to an abstract idea because it is an improved system of copying data. . . . [T]he Court agrees with [defendant] that the focus of the claims is the abstract idea of backing up data. . . . It is true, as [plaintiff] observes, that the specification identifies several disadvantages of the prior art back-up methods. . . . But the claims do not support [plaintiff's] contention. The claims do not provide any concrete details that limit the claimed invention to a specific solution to the problem of remote back-up of digital data. . . . Additionally, the claims use existing computer functionality as a tool to better back up data and do not themselves purport to improve anything about the computer or network itself. . . . Rather, the claims rely on the ordinary storage and transmission capabilities of computers within a network and apply that ordinary functionality in the particular context of remote mirroring. The specification's insistence that the claimed invention is an 'advancement' over the prior art does not overcome the Court's conclusion that the claims as written focus on an abstract idea."

Intellectual Ventures I LLC et al v. Symantec Corporation, 1-13-cv-00440 (DED February 16, 2017, Order) (Stark, USDJ)