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Meet the Lawyer Suing Anyone Who Uses SSL

Posted by samzenpus on from the mine-all-mine dept.

Sparrowvsrevolution writes "Since 2008, Dallas, Texas attorney Erich Spangenberg and his company TQP have been launching suits against hundreds of firms, claiming that merely by using SSL, they've violated a patent TQP acquired in 2006. Nevermind that the patent was actually filed in 1989, long before the World Wide Web was even invented. So far Spangenberg's targets have included Apple, Google, Intel, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, every major bank and credit card company, and scores of web startups and online retailers, practically anyone who encrypts pages of a web sites to protect users' privacy. And while most of those lawsuits are ongoing, many companies have already settled with TQP rather than take the case to trial, including Apple, Amazon, Dell, and Exxon Mobil. The patent has expired now, but Spangenberg can continue to sue users of SSL for six more years and seems determined to do so as much as possible. 'When the government grants you the right to a patent, they grant you the right to exclude others from using it,' says Spangenberg. 'I don't understand why just because [SSL is] prevalent, it should be free.'"

16 of 347 comments (clear)

  1. So by Ultra64 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Who's up for forming a lynch mob?

    1. Re:So by pla · · Score: 5, Funny

      Who's up for forming a lynch mob?

      I'll bring the torches if you bring the pitchforks...

    2. Re:So by camperdave · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Who's up for forming a lynch mob?

      Depends. Who are you going to lynch? The scumbag lawyer? The patent official(s) who granted this patent? The politicians who have been dragging their feet on patent reform? I mean, are we out to change the system, or just to vent on a shrewd individual who is exploiting it?

      --
      When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
    3. Re:So by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yes.

    4. Re:So by gman003 · · Score: 5, Funny

      How about "all of the above"?

    5. Re:So by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Note to self: Patent rope.

    6. Re:So by CuteSteveJobs · · Score: 5, Interesting

      > So even if you win the lawsuit, you might end up losing money in the end.

      Try definitely. In the US your legal fees usually aren't reimbursed, so you will be out of pocket $3-5M *EVEN IF YOU WIN*. Kiss that money goodbye. Under UK rules the winner does get their legal fees reimbursed, but lawyers charge a lot more than that amount so you will still be out of pocket for say half that amount.

      As soon as someone sues you for patent violation - even if their suit is a sham - you're a few million out of pocket. In theory the judge should throw out sham suits, but judges in patent troll counties are a different breed.

    7. Re:So by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Method and Device for Passing Extrajudicial Punishment

      1) .. entailing
      a) identifying and selecting a plurality of subjects
      b) selecting a plurality of suitable vertical objects
      c) fixating subjects (a) on objects (b) by means of rope until full termination of respiration

      2) Method described in (1), where objects are lamp posts
      3) Method described in (1), where objects are trees
      4) Method described in (1), where subjects are politicians
      5) Method described in (1), where subjects are lawyers
      6) Method described in (5), where lawyers deal predominantly with patent issues ...

    8. Re:So by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      I've got the tar.

      I've got the .gz!

  2. So... by MozeeToby · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Nevermind that the patent was actually filed in 1989, long before the World Wide Web was even invented.

    Now, don't get me wrong, this is patent trolling at it's absolute worst, but what exactly is this quote supposed to mean? We (rightly) complain all the freakin time how people shouldn't be granted patents just by adding "on the internet" or "on a computer", we can't have it both ways. If there is a valid patent to provide secure communications through USPS and the key steps of that patent are being performed as part of secure communications online, why shouldn't that be considered to be violating the patent?

    1. Re:So... by Xest · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Personally I think the point there is that if someone files a patent, and doesn't enforce anything about it, then someone else buys it 17 years later by which time due to lack of enforcement around it such that everyone has used it it's become part of essential every day tools, then some dick shouldn't then be able to start suing over it.

      In this respect patents should act like trademarks - if you don't defend against illegal use of it at or near the time of infringement and as a result everyone starts using tools built upon it, then it should be invalidated.

      This idea that you can file a patent, sit quietly on it, and wait until something related to it has become massively widely used and THEN you sue everyone left, right and centre, is fucking absurd.

      The other point is that patent terms are supposed to expire after 20 years. As such can anyone tell me why this guy has another 6 years to sue? Is this about legal limits and he is effectively suing for past infringement even though the patent should've expired 3 years ago? If so then that's another change that needs making to the law - you either sue when the patent is valid, or you don't sue at all.

    2. Re:So... by History's+Coming+To · · Score: 5, Interesting

      We need some reductio ad absurdem on the part of the courts here. Side with the lawyer, outlaw all uses of SSL without a license from him, and have all companies using SSL remove the facility for one day. He's after a little bit of money but he's claiming to want to protect the patent. OK, call his bluff, no money and a protected patent, then let's see how the rest of the world responds when they see what's happening. No more internet banking? No more online trading? No more secure internet sessions? Go on, call his bluff, let's open Pandora's Box Of Patents, it's the only way to bring this nonsense down once and for all.

      --
      Please consider this account deleted, I just can't be bothered with the spam anymore.
  3. 'New' SSL users 'safe' by beaverdownunder · · Score: 5, Interesting

    According to TFA, the patent apparently infringed upon has expired, however this mob can still sue people who used it in the past for the next six years.

    So, if you start a new company now that uses SSL you should be in the clear.

  4. See also Marconi being sued by telegraph companies by dbIII · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Marconi was sued by telegraph companies that thought they had a fifty year monopoly on morse code. The communications IP legal situation has been a sick joke since at least then.

  5. Re:Really? by tgd · · Score: 5, Informative

    "Your sure about that are you?"

    Yes? The web was invented in '92.

    Or are you saying the patent wasn't granted in '89?

    And, more relevantly, HTTPS didn't appear until 1994. (Netscape originated it, as an extension to the HTTP standard -- you needed their browser, and their webserver to be able to use it.)

    So, clearly this is all Netscape's fault.

  6. Prior art by Chrisq · · Score: 5, Informative

    Also, to clarify, this seems to not be over SSL itself, but rather over "using a shared seed value to generate pseudo-random key values at a transmitter and a receiver." RTFA on CipherLaw Blog.

    Isn't CTR-mode use of a cipher block prior art? This was invented in 1979 by Dife and Hellman and in effect turns a key into a series of pseudo random values which are xored with the plain text.