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USPTO Power Outage Damages Equipment and Shuts Down IT Systems (uspto.gov)

Posted by samzenpus on from the experiencing-technical-difficulties dept.

An anonymous reader sends word that many online systems at the United States Patent and Trademark Office are down due to damaged equipment after a power outage. A statement from the USPTO reads in part: "A major power outage at USPTO headquarters occurred last night resulting in damaged equipment that required the subsequent shutdown of many of our online and IT systems. This includes our filing, searching, and payment systems, as well as the systems our examiners across the country use. We are working diligently to assess the operational impact on all our systems and to determine how soon they can be safely brought back into service in the coming days. We understand how critical these systems are for our customers, and our teams will continue to work around the clock to restore them as quickly as possible, though the impacts may be felt through the Christmas holiday. We know many people have questions regarding filing and payment deadlines. We are reviewing this topic and will provide an update when we have further information."

62 comments

  1. Rubber Stamps by Citizen+of+Earth · · Score: 4, Funny

    Guess they'll need to use literal rubber stamps now!

    1. Re:Rubber Stamps by arglebargle_xiv · · Score: 1

      That was my immediate response as well, they'll just have to go back to rubber-stamping every arbitrary patent filing that appears in their inbox by hand. In fact they could just replace the whole patent apparatus with a franking-machine type device that automatically stamps each filing with "Approved once payment clears".

    2. Re:Rubber Stamps by WarJolt · · Score: 1

      That is correct. Then just let lawyers decide which ones are enforceable once they are challenged. I laugh every time I hear someone brag about their patent portfolio before it's been properly vetted by those blood suckers.

    3. Re:Rubber Stamps by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Could this power outage really be a foreign national hacking. Because we know the Iranians are trying to hack damn's in upstate New York. The President of China on his last visit pledged that he wouldn't hack anymore so we know it couldn't be him.

    4. Re:Rubber Stamps by mnooning · · Score: 1

      You obviously know nothing of the process. I lost my first patent attempt after years of work and numerous back and forth rejections from the examiner. I later obtained a patent in a different IT field after 7 years of hard, expensive work, and again numerous rejections. It is very difficult to get a patent.

    5. Re:Rubber Stamps by davester666 · · Score: 1

      That is exactly what isn't working right now, because the powers out. It has been in use so long, nobody knows how to wield the rubber stamp anymore.

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    6. Re:Rubber Stamps by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, it is very hard to get a BAD patent. Devices and processes that are non-obvious and unique should be almost rubber stamped immediately.

      Patents that propose to change the shape of the gears in a cotton gin and claim a new patent SHOULD be rejected.

      .

    7. Re:Rubber Stamps by arglebargle_xiv · · Score: 1

      No, it is very hard to get a BAD patent.

      Actually it's pretty easy to get a bad patent too. Used to work for a company that filed for thousands of patents a year. Some were so embarrassingly bad that the, uh, "inventors" used to draw lots to see who'd be able to put their name last so they wouldn't be listed as the primary inventor.

      Patents that propose to change the shape of the gears in a cotton gin and claim a new patent SHOULD be rejected.

      This is the USPTO you're talking about here, obviousness or the existence of an earlier patent don't rule out patentability. One of my former employers' patents, just from knowledge of the narrow field I worked in, was re-patented at least two more times subsequently by others, and that's only the ones we found out about.

    8. Re:Rubber Stamps by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Where is smitty_one_each? I guarantee that they are able to work one effectively and efficiently.

      Yes, I should be sleeping.

    9. Re: Rubber Stamps by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The United States tried this in the 19th century. It was an abject disaster. The courts were not equipped to handle the flood of cases. In 2015 such a flood would be 10,000 times larger. Such a move would effectively render all patents meaningless due to being unenforceable in aneaningfil way.

  2. Shouldn't this have failed over? by Viewsonic · · Score: 1

    What's a colo?

    1. Re:Shouldn't this have failed over? by sjames · · Score: 5, Funny

      They thought about failover, but weren't sure it wouldn't infringe on a patent so they skipped it.

    2. Re:Shouldn't this have failed over? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Now they are searching if karma has been patented too.

  3. The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by gavron · · Score: 1

    (not in that order tho ;)

    UPSs save lives. If you insist on not backing up your data, not having your equipment on a UPS, and not following standard authentication and encryption standards recommended by industry, have the decency to resign and go home and fall on your blade.

    In my house even my AMOLED TV is on a UPS. Power spikes happen all the time. A $100 UPS will prevent a $200 visit to replace a $100 part in a TV power supply. How is that a bad idea?

    *shees*

    E

    1. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by Citizen+of+Earth · · Score: 1, Funny

      For one thing, you have to replace the UPS battery every year.

    2. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by PPH · · Score: 2

      United Parcel Service. That's a trademarked name, so we can't use it.

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
    3. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A UPS can fail catastrophically, particularly if someone is performing some electrical work upstream and didn't disconnect the UPS from main power.

    4. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by ScentCone · · Score: 1

      A $100 UPS will prevent a $200 visit to replace a $100 part in a TV power supply. How is that a bad idea?

      How? $600 worth of replacement UPS batteries over the life of a $500 TV that will actually be more like obsolete in two years anyway?

      Never had a UPS on a TV. Have never had a TV fail due to any of our many power flickers, sags, spikes, or outages. Sure, it'll happen eventually. In the meantime, I'm many hundreds of dollars ahead of the game (thousands, probably, looking at the period of time I'm talking about) and also not paying for the extra electricity it takes to keep those UPSes awake and happy.

      --
      Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
    5. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by hawguy · · Score: 3, Informative

      For one thing, you have to replace the UPS battery every year.

      3 - 5 years. I some network closet UPS's with 7 year old batteries that are still showing around 60% of original reserve capacity so we haven't bothered replacing them since they'll still last longer than our main server room batteries do in a power outage.

      UPS battery changes are cheaper than replacing hardware that failed because it's not on a UPS.

    6. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by hawguy · · Score: 1

      A UPS can fail catastrophically, particularly if someone is performing some electrical work upstream and didn't disconnect the UPS from main power.

      Upstream electrical work shouldn't affect the UPS, worst case it will trip the UPS over to battery power. Unless by "work" you mean connecting a 120VAC circuit to 480V.

      Even downstream work shouldn't cause any failure, that's what circuit breakers are for.

    7. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by hawguy · · Score: 1

      A $100 UPS will prevent a $200 visit to replace a $100 part in a TV power supply. How is that a bad idea?

      How? $600 worth of replacement UPS batteries over the life of a $500 TV that will actually be more like obsolete in two years anyway?

      Never had a UPS on a TV. Have never had a TV fail due to any of our many power flickers, sags, spikes, or outages. Sure, it'll happen eventually. In the meantime, I'm many hundreds of dollars ahead of the game (thousands, probably, looking at the period of time I'm talking about) and also not paying for the extra electricity it takes to keep those UPSes awake and happy.

      My $1000 3 year old TV is on a $75 UPS. Even if I have to replace the UPS every 5 years, I still consider it money well spent. If nothing else, it prevents short power glitches from interrupting my TV show.

    8. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by Firethorn · · Score: 2

      If you have glitches often enough for it to be a problem, then it's money well spent.

      That being said, I get the idea that people are forgetting that surge suppressors are a thing, and cheaper than UPS units. Hell, I have a whole-house one that I installed on my main breaker box.

      --
      I don't read AC A human right
    9. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yup. Had this happen at my hospital.

      Upstream automatic transfer switch failed somehow resulting in a voltage surge (possibly one of the phases stayed on generator, and two phases switched back to mains, but that's speculation). The UPS rectifier was toast, and when the batteries ran down and the UPS failed over to bypass, a ton of 3 phase downstream equipment got toasted.

      Most of the single phase stuff was OK, but a lot of servers didn't come back up.

    10. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by Dunbal · · Score: 1

      a $500 TV that will actually be more like obsolete in two years

      Jeezus, consumer much?

      --
      Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
    11. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by l0n3s0m3phr34k · · Score: 1

      $600? Just how long do you keep your TVs around? I can buy a name-brand Power Sonic battery through a non-ebay company for under $20, with free shipping. How are you going through 30 batteries over the life of your TV? Even at three years per battery, that means your using the same TV for 90 years?!? Per your stated TV lifetime, you'd have to be replacing the battery almost every week.

    12. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by l0n3s0m3phr34k · · Score: 1

      apparently, since he's also using up 20-30 UPS batteries within two years...since they only cost $20-$30, and his math is "$600 worth of replacement UPS batteries"

    13. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by DigiShaman · · Score: 2

      Even older APC SmartUPS can give a false reading if they've never been fully cycled. Yes, they do a periodic self-test (you can hear the relay clicking when being performed), but not a full discharge and recharge cycle. With batteries that old, you'll be lucky if you get 2 to 5 minutes of runtime out of them at nominal load. In fact, for SmartUPS, they must be recalibrated with a new battery. Typically this used to involve putting a 25% or 33% load until the battery completely drains in order to learn the new runtime metric. We used to use a few halogen lights to provide the test load :)

      --
      Life is not for the lazy.
    14. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by hawguy · · Score: 1

      Even older APC SmartUPS can give a false reading if they've never been fully cycled. Yes, they do a periodic self-test (you can hear the relay clicking when being performed), but not a full discharge and recharge cycle. With batteries that old, you'll be lucky if you get 2 to 5 minutes of runtime out of them at nominal load. In fact, for SmartUPS, they must be recalibrated with a new battery. Typically this used to involve putting a 25% or 33% load until the battery completely drains in order to learn the new runtime metric. We used to use a few halogen lights to provide the test load :)

      We do rundown tests every 6 months where the UPS runs itself on battery for some period of time (15 minutes) and checks the battery state? The UPS's are way oversized for the loads we run on them (2 SU3000's per closet, each closet has between 6 - 12 switches, and we've dramatically cut back on PoE power since most people switched from desk phones to cell phones), and even if we only had 5 minutes of runtime that would be more than enough, the UPS's are mostly there to let the network ride out short power glitches.

    15. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 1

      I always thought it stood for ÜPS, as in "oops", because that's what seems to happen a lot with the packages they send me.

    16. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In my house even my AMOLED TV is on a UPS.

      AMOLED TVs have short lives and will soon need to be replaced anyway so why protect it?

      Power spikes happen all the time. A $100 UPS will prevent a $200 visit to replace a $100 part in a TV power supply. How is that a bad idea?

      Around here power is reliable enough that its a roll of the dice whether UPS will cause more damage than it abates. (self testing going TU or something barfing on MSW)

    17. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by WaffleMonster · · Score: 1

      We do rundown tests every 6 months where the UPS runs itself on battery for some period of time (15 minutes) and checks the battery state?

      Why abuse batteries like this? What did they do to you?

      When not being boiled by crappy chargers they are discharged to low SOC at unnecessarily high rate for no useful reason (~$10 BOM hit for useful dummy load obviously out of the question). To pour salt on the wound same crappy chargers spend days trickling current back into batteries because UPS manufacturers don't care.

      People wonder why they have to pay to replace batteries so often when they appear to just sit there idle 99.99% of the time.

    18. Re:The first three letters of USPTO are UPS... by DigiShaman · · Score: 1

      It's good to perform a test load on them once in a while, but even if you don't, 5 years and they'll need to be replaced; if not to address a potential hazard. They're lead acid cells. They dry out, bloat, and in some cases vent violently!.

      Some consumer grade UPS units are so cheap that it makes no sense to replace just the battery. With those, you're better off replacing the whole thing as all the internal components wear out with age to. But, if you wish to go with a generic replacement battery assuming you know the cell type, Batteries Plus is a good place to start.

      --
      Life is not for the lazy.
  4. Power Problems by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    One glorious day will power scaling systems become a reality. We shouldn't have to wait for the coming of spintronics.

    1. Re:Power Problems by Tablizer · · Score: 0

      I patented a blackout preventor, but it's stuck in the patent office because of their blackout.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
  5. Data centers have had power switching fails by Joe_Dragon · · Score: 1

    Data centers have had power switching fails some times it just cuts all power other times fires and with a fire when the firemen say cut all power they mean do it now.

  6. Time to abolish patents by Tablizer · · Score: 1

    Perhaps it's a side topic, but in my opinion patents do more harm than good. Big expensive labs that do nothing but invent are a rarity now. Most discoveries happen in the course of making something specific and would happen anyhow. Patents just hamper the little tinkerers and make lawyers rich.

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
    1. Re:Time to abolish patents by unencode200x · · Score: 1

      It might happen organically. It doesn't sound like they have a good DR plan. I hope their backups work. They said "several days," that's not a good sign.

      --

      Chance favors the prepared mind.
      Perfect is the enemy of good.
    2. Re:Time to abolish patents by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Perhaps it's a side topic

      PERHAPS????

    3. Re:Time to abolish patents by CaptQuark · · Score: 1

      The USPTO can (and does) award patents for almost anything. The patent examiners aren't experts in every field and if they receive advice that an item, method, or process is unique and non-obvious, they will award a patent.

      But a patent is just a pretty piece of paper until you try to enforce it. Only then will the courts actually look at the merit of the patent and declare it enforceable or invalid.

      The main reason for granting patents is to persuade inventors to publish their ideas so knowledge will spread and in return they are given exclusive licensing rights for a reasonable amount of time. The publishing and sharing of new ideas is the good side of patents. The litigation necessary to challenge or defend a patent is the unfortunate bad side.

      --

    4. Re:Time to abolish patents by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      The main reason for granting patents is to persuade inventors to publish their ideas so knowledge will spread and in return they are given exclusive licensing rights for a reasonable amount of time.

      I know that, but it's not working as intended. There's no evidence companies heavily use patent searches to make something or make something better. They mostly use them to avoid getting sued. The court battles and the practice of holding products and product ideas "hostage" is too large a counter cost.

      Overall, the costs outweigh the benefits. Mostly only large companies can make anything because only they have enough legal leverage and counter-patents (threats) to get anything done.

      And stupid judges and juries don't know "obvious" from a hole in the wall.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    5. Re:Time to abolish patents by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      It's half related.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
  7. No DR then by martin · · Score: 1

    Seems odd theres not BC/DR here

    1. Re:No DR then by unencode200x · · Score: 1

      It's never a priority until it's needed. People say we can live without that system for a few days or weeks or whatever. My response is, well let's do a DR test and turn it off for a few days.

      --

      Chance favors the prepared mind.
      Perfect is the enemy of good.
    2. Re:No DR then by bws111 · · Score: 1

      BC/DR does not mean no outages. It doesn't even mean no extended outages. It simply means that there is a plan on how to eventually recover. The acceptable length of time to recovery entirely depends on the impact of the outage. If every second of downtime means lost money, having a hot backup datacenter in a different location makes sense. If, like in this case, a few days of downtime make no real difference (it can take years to go through the patent process, what is another few days going to matter), then a DR plan of 'buy new hardware and restore from backup tapes' may make the most sense.

  8. Their UPS patent expired by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Because of a patent troll

  9. 5 day weekend! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sounds like someone on the inside wanted a few extra days off for Christmas.

  10. Hitec UPS? by aaarrrgggh · · Score: 1

    Way back when, they were putting in Hitec UPSs, a diesel-rotary flywheel system for backup power. About 7-10 years ago, 365 Main In San Francisco had an outage with these units after a few consecutive short outages. I know Hitec updated the firmware on the system to change timings, but I wonder if these units were ever "patched."

    Oh well... Nothing of value lost and all that.

  11. Outage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    From what I heard the flywheel based Uninterruptible Power Supply for the data center failed. They do have a supposedly high tech UPS system. Although the flywheel systems are only supposed to give you enough time to power up a diesel backup generator. No details on the failure yet or how long it will take to recover. But it won't a merry christmas in PTOland.

  12. Longer patent turnaround? by BigBuckHunter · · Score: 1

    So instead of a patent taking 4 years to grant, it's now going to take 4 years and 30 days? Oh the humanity! This is a deal breaker and changes everything.

  13. Customers by steveg · · Score: 1

    I'm a little disturbed by their use of the term "customers". It's a bad sign that they consider patent applicants to be customers. It implies that it's their job to grant patents--denying a patent would not be serving their customers.

    Yeah, I know, this isn't new. It's been their attitude for years, but I hate having our noses rubbed in it.

    --
    Ignorance killed the cat. Curiosity was framed.
    1. Re: Customers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Section 102 says that a person is ENTITLED to a patent, unless there is prior art. If you have a problem with patents being an entitlement, you should bring it up with your legislators.

  14. USPTO power outage damages equipment .. by nickweller · · Score: 1

    By any chance would this equipment be running on Microsoft Windows.

    1. Re:USPTO power outage damages equipment .. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hey genius, you've got that backwards. Software runs on hardware. Power outage would have nothing to do with their OS.

  15. USPTO delivers an early christmas present by WaffleMonster · · Score: 1

    It would be a very merry Christmas for all if patents end up expiring due to non payment of maintenance fees.

    USPTO IT please stay home and celebrate Christmas then celebrate the new year away from USPTO systems for the whole of 2016. Nobody will mind a brief 1 year outage... honest.

  16. How does a power outage cause damage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Stuff just turns off, OK well I suppose a HD being written to could become corrupted.
    Now a power surge, that's another matter. I live in an area where they are common and they can be destructive (especially when a 60KV line falls on a 12KV one)

    1. Re:How does a power outage cause damage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The patent office must have been using SSDs without power loss protection.

  17. Customers doesn't quite have that meaning by dbIII · · Score: 1

    Don't get too hung up on it and add extra meaning that is not there. "The customer is always right" is a statement that become utter bullshit in a variety of circumstances even if it is the catch cry of retail. I used to do weld tests and the ones that failed stayed failed no matter what the customer wanted in the short term. Services have defined limits.

    1. Re:Customers doesn't quite have that meaning by jellomizer · · Score: 1

      "The customer is always right"
      That term mostly was used to try to prevent employees from getting into arguments with customers over trivial matters. If the customer was a Yankees fan, don't start busting him because you are a Red Sox fan, or if they come ranting about politics just politely agree with his politics and get back to business. However the customer goes to you for a service or product. If it is a product you can choose to trade it for currency or not. for a service, they pay for the work involved and no guarantee that they will get there way.
      There are a lot of companies/organizations that offer services which the customer may not get what they want.
      Colleges and schools, will fail or kick out students who do not meet academic or social political norms.
      Certification agencies may reject to offer a certification if the customer fails to meet the criteria.
      Doctors may not be able to treat the patient, or refuse some treatments as it would be considered not worth it. ...
      Now if you want to keep customers you should try to be accommodating if you are certification agency you should at least give them a write-up on how they failed. if you are a school you should offer services to help reverse at risk students. Doctors should try to treat the patents or refer them to someone who can help.

      The Patent office while gets a lot of Slashdot hate, because of the rules about allowing software patents is at odds with the Free and Open Source Software movement. However they do more then just software patents, and such patents protect the inventor from some large company seeing their idea and ripping them off. Yes they are patent trolls who make overly generic patents who will bully their way to money, and this needs to be stopped. But there should be more focus on fixing the problems then just hate against the organization.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    2. Re:Customers doesn't quite have that meaning by dbIII · · Score: 1

      Pity I can't mod that up.

  18. I'm calling bullshit by THE_WELL_HUNG_OYSTER · · Score: 1

    They were hacked or were being hacked. They took the systems offline to prevent further theft of data.

    1. Re: I'm calling bullshit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I agree with the hacking theory. These are the same tools that claimed the emails from a staff member (called into court via discovery) were stored in a .pst file and lost when the user's hard disk failed! (Not using exchange??? - does not use .pst files). Total BS this story and most likely a cover up again. No DR or offsite recovery? Not in the cloud? Either 100% incompetence or 100% BS!

  19. Laywer emails me this morning... by Mr.CRC · · Score: 1

    "I'd better send him my final rev. of the application due tomorrow within a few hours" after I got to work. I had expected to have until the end of the day. The night before I had almost given up in despair, that the thing could ever be made so that his way of saying what I tried to tell him was invented could ever make sense. And that he covered the important shit, instead of the irrelevant stuff.

    By some miracle I was able to send it off within a couple hours.

    My first and hopefully last experience with patents (though his Claims are still completely looking the wrong way, so we'll have to amend those later.)

    I basically hate patents. My boss made me do it. Yesterday came close to being my last day working there. And I still haven't decided if 2015 will have been my last year there. Thankfully, I've got a couple weeks off to think about it.