14 DAY TRIAL // Google’s battle against patent trolls has been going on for a while now. The most recent chapter in this story involves Google filing a lawsuit against Rockstar, a patent group backed by Apple and Microsoft.
The Internet giant probably wouldn’t have bothered, had Rockstar not filed a suit against the Android mobile operating system.
Back in October, Rockstar decided to sue Google and several of its Android hardware partners, including Asustek, LG and Samsung. This week, Google has officially filed a countersuit, arguing that Android doesn’t infringe any of the patents that Rockstar has.
Rockstar, which is a consortium formed by a number of companies, including Apple, Microsoft and BlackBerry, is listed as being part of the patent monetization industry, which basically translates into “patent troll” – a company that seeks to make money by suing other businesses for infringing some document or another. Back in 2012, Business Insider listed it as the third most fearsome company of its kind.
Google hopes to shield its partners from attacks, claiming that Rockstar has “placed a cloud on Google’s Android platform.”
For its part, Rockstar says that Android mobile devices infringe several of its patents, including those involving data connection sharing, messaging and notifications. Google counters that since Rockstar doesn’t actually use any of its patents, it shouldn’t be allowed to bring forth such lawsuits.
Despite the fact that the October case was filed in Texas, Google is countering it in San Jose, California, hoping that the case is moved, given the tendency of Texan judges to let litigators win.
In recent years, companies throughout the United States and beyond, backed by scholar communities and lawmakers, have protested against the faulty patent system in the USA, which allows the purchase of such documents by companies that don’t actually put them to use for anything else than to sue other businesses.
Google isn’t the only company to get this treatment, but it is one of the biggest names on a list that includes countless small businesses.