AT&T Sues PayPal and eBay for Patent Infringement

theodp writes "AT&T on Thursday fired the latest shot in the escalating Web patent wars, filing suit against PayPal and eBay. AT&T issued a press release alleging that the PayPal and BillPoint payment systems infringe on AT&T's 1994 patent for the mediation of transactions by a communications system. Besides e-Payments, the AT&T patent purports to cover e-Voting, e-Auctions, e-Gifts, e-Donations, e-Wishlists and e-Referrals. e-Gad! e-Yikes!"