CyberSource: Machines Executing Processes and the Computer-Readable Medium

Since the Bilski v. Kappos decision, 130 S. Ct. 3218 (2010), practitioners in the software arts have debated whether the inclusion of a computer or computer-readable medium in claims that include process steps would render claims patentable. In CyberSource v. Retail Decisions, No. 2009-1358 (Aug. 16, 2011), a panel of the Federal Circuit affirmed a district court's summary judgment ruling that the asserted patent claims were invalid under 35 U.S.C. ' 101, and held that purely mental processes are unpatentable abstract ideas. The court rejected “CyberSource's main argument ' that coupling the unpatentable mental process ' with a manufacture or machine renders it patent-eligible.” Specifically, the court decided that merely limiting an unpatentable mental process to a computer-readable medium for execution on a processor, in a so-called Beauregard claim, did not satisfy ' 101.