infringe

Facebook shutters The Cool Hunter for copyright issues

Facebook has cracked the whip on The Cool Hunter. After little warning the social network shuttered the design and pop-culture Web site's Facebook page eight weeks ago, leaving both the founder and its 788,000 fans wondering what went wrong.

In a blog post this week, founder Bill Tikos bemoaned the shutdown and said that it has severely hurt the site's business. According to Tikos, its Facebook fan base grew by 1,500 to 2,500 per day and also generated more than 10,000 click-throughs to the site per day. Overall, The Cool Hunter has 2.1 … Read more

Swedish ISP confirms police raid targeted illegal file-sharing

Swedish police raided Web host PRQ earlier this week but it wasn't clear what they were after. Now, the ISP's owner is saying that the authorities seized servers for Web sites that allegedly dealt in illegal file-sharing.

According to TorrentFreak, police took three servers -- one belonged to one of Sweden's popular torrent sites called Tankafetast, another to an alleged Android app piracy site called Appbucket. It's unclear what was on the third server.

On Monday, the authorities targeted PRQ, which is known for hosting some of the most popular outlaw sites on the Internet. Former … Read more

Apple hit by patent suit over Passbook

Apple is in the middle of another lawsuit, this one over charges that its Passbook app violates several patents of software developer Ameranth.

In the court document, Ameranth, which sells software and services to the hospitality and gaming industry, claims that Passbook violates four of its U.S. patents -- No. 6,384,850, No. 6,871,325, No. 6,982,733, and No. 8,146,077.

All four patents deal with "Information management and synchronous communications system." As such, they cover the ability to synchronize data among wired, wireless, and Web-based systems for electronic menus and reservations … Read more

Swedish police raid former Web host for Pirate Bay, Wikileaks

The Swedish police seem to be going straight to the source in their battle against copyright infringement. According to Forbes, the country's authorities raided the Stolckholm-based Web host PRQ, which is known for hosting some of the most popular outlaw sites on the Internet, including the Pirate Bay, Wikileaks, the North America Man-Boy Love Association, Pedophile.se, and the Chechen rebel site Kavkaz Central.

It's unclear why police raided PRQ, but its owner Mikael Viborg told the Swedish news outlet Nyheter24 that he believes the investigation had to do with intellectual property violations, according to TorrentFreak. Viborg also … Read more

Samsung hit by OLED patent lawsuit from LG Display

Already reeling from legal battles with Apple, Samsung is the target of yet another patent lawsuit.

LG Display said today that it has filed a patent infringement suit against the handset maker, alleging that Samsung violated seven of its OLED (organic light-emitting diode) patents.

The lawsuit specifically claims that Samsung infringed on the design of LG's OLED panels, driver circuitry and device design, reported the Wall Street Journal. LG is looking for an unspecified amount in damages and a permanent injunction of five infringing products, including the Galaxy S3 phone, the Galaxy Tab 7.7 tablet, and the Galaxy … Read more

Apple wants $3B in damages from Samsung, says report

Apple will reportedly request $3 billion in damages from Samsung for patent infringement, triple the amount initially awarded by a court.

Attorneys for Apple plan to ask U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh to order Samsung to pay $3 billion after losing the recent patent suit between the two companies, reports the Korea Times. A hearing is set for Friday in which Apple will argue its case.

In seeking triple the amount in damages, Apple would likely rely on a jury decision that found Samsung guilty of "willfull infringement" on five of the six patents in question. This … Read more

Zynga countersues EA for alleged 'anticompetitive' practices

Zynga is countering Electronic Arts' allegations of infringement with a compliant over what the social-gaming company characterizes as "anticompetitive and unlawful business practices," Zynga said in a statement today.

The company filed a three-part response today to EA's lawsuit, which accused Zynga of ripping off EA's Sims Social game.

"Today we responded to EA's claims which we believe have no merit," Zynga General Counsel Reggie Davis said in a statement today. "We also filed a counterclaim which addresses actions by EA we believe to be anticompetitive and unlawful business practices, including legal … Read more

Apple wins 'rubber-banding' patent ban against Motorola

Apple has eked out yet another legal victory against its Android competition.

After a five-week delay, a regional court in Munich, Germany, ruled that Apple can file for an injunction against Motorola phones and tablets following claims of patent infringement, according to Foss Patents' Florian Mueller. The patent in question deals with the so-called "rubber-banding" feature, an effect that causes a page on a mobile device to bounce back up after a user has swiped to the bottom of the screen.

Describing the technology in both a European patent and U.S. patent, Apple had accused Motorola of … Read more

Google wipes Pirate Bay from Autocomplete searches

It seems like Google is finally complying with the Recording Industry Association of America's wishes by not showing alleged copyright infringing Web sites in its Instant and Autocomplete search features.

According to TorrentFreak, the search giant just added the Pirate Bay to its censorship list.

Now, when users type "thepiratebay.org" or any of the site's other domain names into their search box, nothing relating to the Pirate Bay's Web site pops up. However, the file-sharing site is still indexed in Google's overall search function.

The RIAA has been working hard over the past … Read more

Oracle wants more than the $306 million promised in SAP lawsuit

Oracle is due to receive a hefty amount in legal damages from SAP, but the database giant wants more.

In early August, SAP agreed to pay Oracle $306 million following a trial that found SAP guilty of copyright infringement. The jury verdict reached in 2010 determined that Oracle should receive $1.3 billion in damages.

But last September, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton deemed that amount excessive and gave Oracle a choice of accepting $272 million in damages or requesting a new trial.

The amount ballooned to the$306 million agreed upon last month. At the time, Oracle general … Read more