The USPTO notified some, it turns out me too, cannot authenticate themselves to the system beginning on or about January 15. If you cannot authenticate, the USPTO suggested to upgrade to Java 7 update 51. I also had to restart the computer after the update to resolve the authentication issue.
The USPO recommends if the authentication issue continues, contact the Patent Electronic Business Center from 6:00 am to 12:00 midnight (ET) Monday through Friday: 1-866-217-9197 or ebc@uspto.gov.
Now to authenticate on private PAIR or EFS you take the following steps:
1. Click
on digital certificate field or browse button, then an Entrust Publisher's dialog box
appears "Do you want to run this application?" Click on the Run button and check the box you don't want to see this dialog again.
This displays the private PAIR login with the digital certificate file path and an empty
password field.
2. Check the
box that "I understand that the technology in patent application may be
subject to U.S. dual-use export controls (Without step 2, you may not be able to insert the digital certificate).
3. Browse on your computer to the digital certificate and double click on it to insert the certificate into login field.
4. Type your password.
5. Click on the authenticate button.
Copyright © 2014 Robert Moll. All rights reserved.