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Technology
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May 15, 2013
Apple Points To EU Antitrust Ruling In Import Ban Fight
Apple Inc. again urged the U.S. International Trade Commission on Tuesday to reject Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.'s attempts to ban imports of certain iPhones and iPads into the U.S., arguing a similar bid by Motorola Mobility LLC in Germany was found to violate European antitrust law.
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May 15, 2013
FTC Outlines Kids' Online Privacy Expansion For Businesses
More than 90 companies that make mobile apps for children have received letters from the Federal Trade Commission outlining the revised Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, the commission said Wednesday, as it prepares to implement stricter privacy rules on July 1.
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May 15, 2013
Apple Blasts 'Ringmaster' Label In E-Book Price-Fixing Case
The U.S. Department of Justice described Apple Inc. in documents released Tuesday as the “ringmaster” of an alleged conspiracy with major publishers to fix e-book prices, but Apple fired back, saying it had actually acted independently, in the interest of its own business.
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May 15, 2013
Deals Rumor Mill: Sinopec, Siemens, Activision
Sinopec is ready to gain big through its engineering unit's anticipated $1.9 billion initial public offering, while Activision has hit a brick wall in talks with parent company Vivendi SA over the terms of a major share buyback that could be worth as much as $10 billion.
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May 15, 2013
Google's Privacy Policy Violates Calif. Law, Watchdog Says
Consumer Watchdog on Wednesday lashed out at Google Inc., calling its privacy policy fundamentally deceptive and accusing the search engine giant of violating California's Online Privacy Protection Act.
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May 15, 2013
FTC Commissioner Defends Ending Google Probe
Federal Trade Commissioner Maureen K. Ohlhausen on Wednesday defended the commission's decision to close its search bias investigation of Google Inc., saying the search giant's algorithms and practices had a negligible antitrust effect and that an agency remedy wouldn't have been effective.
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May 14, 2013
Aereo Fires Back At Networks' IP Claims In Streaming TV Row
Streaming Internet TV provider Aereo Inc. on Tuesday fired back against networks including NBC Studios LLC suing it in New York federal court for rebroadcasting their content without a license, citing the Second Circuit’s ruling that Aereo's service does not involve public performances of copyrighted shows.
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May 14, 2013
Calif. Senate OKs Bill Requiring Warrants For Email Access
The California Senate passed a bill Monday that would require state law enforcement officials to get a search warrant before asking service providers to disclose the contents of their customers' emails.
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May 14, 2013
SEC Head Orders Review Of Cyberthreat Disclosure Guidance
U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Mary Jo White has asked her staff to assess the effectiveness of staff-level guidance that pushes companies to disclose cyberthreats in their regulatory filings in order to determine if a more stern directive is needed, she said in a letter released Monday.
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May 14, 2013
Chunghwa Exec Says Feds' Price-Fixing Suit Is Time-Barred
Attorneys for a former Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd. executive living in Taiwan, outside the reach of U.S. prosecutors, urged a California federal judge Tuesday to dismiss an indictment alleging he conspired to fix prices on television color display tubes, arguing that prosecutors missed statutory deadlines to bring the charges.
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May 14, 2013
ITC Asked To Probe Samsung, Others Over Music-Sharing Tech
Black Hills Media LLC seeks to expand litigation against Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., LG Electronics Inc. and others it accuses of importing products into the U.S. that infringe patents for its music-sharing technology, requesting on Monday that the U.S. International Trade Commission open an investigation into several types of electronic devices.
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May 14, 2013
Motorola FRAND Ruling Supports Our Case, Apple Says
Apple Inc. told the Federal Circuit on Friday that a judge's recent ruling setting licensing rates for Motorola Mobility LLC's standard-essential patents supports many of the positions Apple has taken in its own dispute with Motorola over related issues.
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May 14, 2013
Microsoft Settles Map-Service Claims In Ongoing Patent Suit
GeoTag Inc. has agreed to drop claims that Microsoft Corp.'s Bing Maps service and other map-related products infringe the nonpracticing entity's store-locator patent, according to a stipulation approved Tuesday that said the parties would continue litigating other claims.
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May 14, 2013
Google Says Users Are Rehashing Old Privacy Claims
Google Inc. asked a California federal judge Tuesday to dismiss a putative class action accusing the company of violating privacy laws by storing and aggregating user data under its universal privacy policy, arguing that the plaintiffs' new claims were rehashed versions of ones dismissed last year.
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May 14, 2013
Accused Insider Traders In Brocade Deal Plead Not Guilty
A former hedge fund professional and a corporate insider accused of sharing then-confidential details of a $3 billion acquisition by networking company Brocade Communications Systems Inc. pled not guilty Tuesday to insider trading charges.
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May 14, 2013
Dell Accuses Toshiba, Sony Of Fixing Prices For Disk Drives
Dell Inc. on Monday struck Toshiba Corp., Sony Corp., Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. and other major electronics companies with an antitrust lawsuit in Texas federal court, accusing them of engaging in a wide-ranging conspiracy to fix prices in the market for optical disk drives.
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May 14, 2013
Google Rival Urges EU To Reject Search Antitrust Deal
A Google Inc. rival warned Tuesday that the company's proposed antitrust settlement with the European Commission wouldn't stop the Internet giant from manipulating its search results to the detriment of its competitors and might even make the situation worse.
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May 14, 2013
7th Circ.'s Posner Calls For Crackdown On Patent Proliferation
The sheer number of patents in the U.S. is fueling frivolous litigation and drastic action is needed to make patents more difficult to obtain and easier to invalidate, U.S. Circuit Judge Richard Posner of the Seventh Circuit said Tuesday.
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May 14, 2013
Check-Imaging Patent Owner Ducks $15B Fraud Suit
Patent-licensing company DataTreasury Corp. and its founder were dismissed Friday from a $15 billion fraud lawsuit that claimed they bilked an early investor out of profits they made by licensing their oft-asserted check-imaging patent to banks.
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May 14, 2013
AUO Pushes 9th Circ. To Nix $500M Antitrust Verdict
AU Optronics Corp. again urged the Ninth Circuit on Monday to overturn its $500 million price-fixing conviction, warning that the U.S. Department of Justice hadn't made a convincing argument for why U.S. antitrust law should reach the foreign electronics company's actions abroad.
Expert Analysis
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How EU Data Protection Laws Apply To Mobile Apps
European data protection regulators recently issued a 30-page opinion addressing how mobile apps should comply with EU data protection law. While the opinion is not binding, it gives a clear indication of how data protection authorities in the EU would interpret their national laws and therefore should be taken into account when developing new apps targeted at EU individuals, say attorneys with Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.
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Takeaways From The Microsoft Internet Explorer Saga
The European Commission recently imposed a fine on Microsoft Corp. of $730 million for failure to abide by a commitment made in 2009 to make a browser-choice screen available to PC users. The commission's huge fine sends a strong signal to companies that failure to comply with the terms of a settlement will not be tolerated in any circumstance, say attorneys with McDermott Will & Emery LLP.
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NPEs Are Undaunted By Recent Patent Reform
Recent court decisions and legislative action have offered corporations hope of significant relief from the flood of patent suits filed by nonpracticing entities. The early returns, however, suggest that these measures have done little to deter the proliferation of the NPE business model, says Mark Supko of Crowell & Moring LLP.
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Challenges In Conducting Breach Investigations: Part 1
Companies' data breach and cyber intrusion responses are commonly too narrowly shaped by state security breach notification requirements, industry rules governing payment card breaches and the absence of a direct legal obligation requiring a more comprehensive review. In critical instances, these responses are insufficient, says Kim Peretti of Alston & Bird LLP.
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Supreme Court Tames Class Action Frankenstein's Monster
The unanimous U.S. Supreme Court decision in Standard Fire Insurance Co. v. Knowles will be praised by class action defense counsel as comporting with the congressional intent of the Class Action Fairness Act and ramifying the pleading strategies used by putative class representatives to maximize the litigation leverage of the "Frankenstein's monster" created by class actions, say attorneys with Fulbright & Jaworski LLP.
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Italian Court's Google Decision: A Significant Precedent
The appellate court in Milan recently published its decision overturning the conviction of three Google Inc. executives for allowing video depicting the bullying of an autistic teenager to be uploaded to the Italian Google Video website. The opinion reduces the potential burdens facing content-hosting providers and other similar Internet companies, say attorneys with Jones Day.
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In Re Hubbell Puts Inventors At A Disadvantage
Obviousness-type double patenting usually arises between commonly owned patents or patent applications. While the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has interpreted the judicially created doctrine as pertaining when there is common or overlapping inventorship, without regard to common ownership, the Federal Circuit had not upheld that interpretation of the doctrine until recently in In re Hubbell, says Courtenay Brinckerhoff of Foley & Lardner LLP
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Do SEP Holders Seeking Injunctions Violate Section 2?
Recent U.S. Department of Justice speeches and statements indicate that the DOJ may be searching for ways to enforce a policy of using Section 2 of the Sherman Act to discourage standard essential patent holders who license their patents on fair, reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms from seeking injunctive relief against alleged infringers. This would be a significant development in its regulatory agenda, says Wendy Fu of Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP.
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7 Reasons To Do Pro Bono Work
Research shows that helping others and cultivating social relationships makes us happier and that generous people live longer, healthier lives. These are just a few of the countless reasons to create time in our busy schedules to do pro bono and charitable work this year, says Anne Brafford of Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP.
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Avoid The Top 10 Pitfalls In A Jury Charge Conference
It can be a challenge even for experienced trial lawyers to keep one eye on the present trial and one eye on the future appellate record, as the charge conference requires. But being aware of the major pitfalls of the conference, and how to avoid them, will pay big dividends later, say Dawn Solowey and Lynn Kappelman of Seyfarth Shaw LLP.