Apple Assigned Three Patents

Multi-user storage volume encryption via secure processor
Apple Inc., Cupertino, CA, has been assigned a patent (11,455,432) developed by Martel, Pierre Olivier, Mountain View, CA, Mesh, Arthur, San Francisco, CA, and Benson, Wade, San Jose, CA, for a “multi-user storage volume encryption via secure processor.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “Embodiments described herein enable multi-user storage volume encryption via a secure enclave processor. One embodiment provides for a computing device comprising a first processor to execute a first operating system having one or more user accounts, a second processor to execute a second operating system, the second processor to receive a first encrypted key from the first processor and decrypt a volume encryption key via a key encryption key derived from the first encrypted key, the first encrypted key derived via the secure enclave without user-provided entropy, and a non-volatile memory controller to access encrypted data within non-volatile memory using the volume encryption key.”

The patent application was filed on June 8, 2020 (16/895,933).

Techniques for performing incremental data backups
Apple Inc., Cupertino, CA, has been assigned a patent (11,449,389) developed by MCisler, Pavel, Redwood City, CA, Sokolov, Pavel, Menlo Park, CA, Giampaolo, Dominic B., Lewiston, ME, Weiss, Eric A., Paris, France, and Wolf, Christopher A., Bahama, NC, for “techniques for performing incremental data backup.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “The embodiments set forth techniques for performing incremental backups of a source file system volume (FSV) managed by a source computing device. According to some embodiments, the source computing device can be configured to generate a current snapshot of the source FSV, where the current snapshot complements a previous snapshot of the source FSV (e.g., established during a previous backup). In some cases, to free up storage space, the data for files belonging to the source FSV can be stripped from the previous snapshot (where metadata for the files remains intact). Next, the source computing device can generate, within a destination storage device, a second snapshot of a destination FSV (that corresponds to the source FSV). In turn, the source computing device identifies changes made to the source FSV based on the current snapshot and the previous snapshot, and reflects the changes within the second snapshot of the destination FSV.”

The patent application was filed on December 13, 2017 (15/841,283).

Rebalancing of user accounts among partitions of storage service
Apple Inc., Cupertino, CA, has been assigned a patent (11,442,632) developed by Favre-Felix, Nicolas A., San Francisco, CA, Shraer, Alexander, Kirkland, WA, Herrnstadt, Ori, Los Altos Hills, CA, and Williams, Nathan L., San Francisco, CA, for “rebalancing of user accounts among partitions of a storage service.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “This application relates to load balancing for a number of partitions of a network-based storage service. Each partition includes a number of server devices and/or network devices located in a data center and configured to provide access to storage resources hosted within the data center. User accounts are assigned to a particular partition such that requests related to a particular user account are routed to that partition. Periodically, a load balancing algorithm is executed to re-assign user accounts to different partitions to rebalance resource consumption across the different partitions. The load balancing algorithm can balance resource consumption for any number of resource types by generating a vector of resource utilization parameters for each user account, sorting the plurality of user accounts into clusters based on the vectors, and mapping at least some user accounts to different partitions.”

The patent application was filed on September 20, 2018 (16/137,372).