Blackberry sues Facebook for Patent Infringement
Blackberry had moved forward with a lawsuit filed in California against Facebook for infringing numerous patents, including US patents 7,372,961; 8,209,634; 8,279,173; 8,301,713; 8,429,236; 8,677,250; and 9,349,120. Blackberry is asserting that Facebook and its subsidiaries are infringing these patents, specifically with regard to messaging applications including, Facebook and Facebook Messenger for Android and iOS devices, WhatsApp Messenger for Android and iOS devices, and Instagram for Android and iOS devices, as well as the Facebook website. Blackberry's patents cover a range of features and represent their portfolio-based approach, where a number of patent applications are filed on various aspects of a product. This creates the greatest uncertainty for Facebook - while they might be able to dodge one or two patents, dodging the whole portfolio becomes much more difficult. Balckberry's patents are not pure software patents, but rather some address the interface with har...