Slashdot Mirror
Apple Must Pay Patent Troll More Than $500 Million In iMessage Case (bloomberg.com)
A federal court in Texas today has ordered Apple to pay $502.6 million to a patent troll called VirnetX, the latest twist in a dispute now in its eighth year. "VirnetX claimed that Apple's FaceTime, VPN on Demand and iMessage features infringe four patents related to secure communications, claims that Apple denied," reports Bloomberg. From the report: The dispute has bounced between the district court, patent office and Federal Circuit since 2010. There have been multiple trials, most recently one involving earlier versions of the Apple devices. A jury in that case awarded $302 million that a judge later increased to $439.7 million. Kendall Larsen, CEO of VirnetX, said the damages, which were based on sales of more than 400 million Apple devices, were "fair." "The evidence was clear," Larsen said after the verdict was announced. "Tell the truth and you don't have to worry about anything." For VirnetX, the jury verdict in its favor could be a short-lived victory. The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has said the patents are invalid, in cases that are currently before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington. The Federal Circuit, which handles all patent appeals, declined to put this trial on hold, saying it was so far along that a verdict would come before a final validity decision.
Not much more to it really.
Never happened. True story.
Sounds like they have a software product.
Do they really, though? Go read the product page for the "Gabriel" software. It's all fluff, and reads like one of those pages you might accidentally stumble upon when you use google and the results turn out to be just spam pages repeating the same key-phrase ad nauseum.
How many customers do they have? Does the software actually make use of the patents in questions? When did they begin development of this product?
As far as I can tell their "product" didn't come into existence until 2014, whereas they've been suing apple since 2010.
They certainly seem to fit definition of a patent troll. The fact that they eventually pumped out some software is mere window-dressing; most likely it's intended to lend them credibility rather than actually attract customers.
The sorts of Libertarians that post here are a weird US only thing as far as I can tell.
I guess you have to grow up with an extreme level of right-wing propaganda surrounding you all your life before you can take any of that nonsense seriously.
They're just useful idiots for the US ruling class anyway, ignore them.