Microsoft's TomTom suit includes Linux claims

REDMOND, Wash.--Although Microsoft is not highlighting the issue, the patent infringement lawsuits it filed on Wednesday against TomTom include claims related to that company's use of the Linux kernel.

While the software maker has asserted for years that Linux infringes on its patents, this appears to be the first time Microsoft has made the claim in court.

In an interview with CNET News earlier on Wednesday, Microsoft deputy general counsel Horacio Gutierrez noted that five of the claims related to car navigation technologies while three were related to file management technologies. However, neither in its federal court filing nor in the interview did Gutierrez mention that the suit involved Linux, although Gutierrez did confirm that fact to Seattle-area technology site TechFlash.

Back in 2007, Microsoft made public its claim that Linux violates 235 of Microsoft's patents.

Since then, Microsoft has struck a number of patent licensing deals, most notably with Novell, that provide signing companies with patent protection against Linux claims. Microsoft also announced a year ago that it would not sue individual open source developers, though it said it retained the right to sue companies over their use of Linux.

I've asked Microsoft for further details and expect to update this post later this evening.

Update 9:15 p.m. PT: Gutierrez had a fair amount to say on the topic, so I have posted an additional story here.

[ddhboy]

A clever move. Its not like Microsoft can sue Linux, there's no one company producing linux oses, so they're just going to sue people who use Linux in their systems as a proxy to affect linux development. I wonder which one of the blood sucking lawyers at Microsoft dreamed this one up.

[UpajOs]

Microsoft should take a lesson from the RIAA and their idiotic policy of suing anything that moves. The RIAA has succeeded in sending music CD sales into the basement, and it's just a matter of time now until the traditional recording industry ceases to exist. May Microsoft is angling for the same fate.

[another_cissp]

The rumor is that its over vfat used on the storage cards.

[pentest]

LOL<br /><br />fat is obvious and based on prior art.

[a_quietamerican]

@dhboy - So, Microsoft is forced to hand massive patent royalty checks over to IBM every year b/c of IBM's world leading patent portfolio, probably Sun too. And Microsoft should be forced to let IBM and Sun use Linux/OSS as their excuse for not paying Microsoft for using its innovations to make billions every year? That doesn't seem fair at all. <br /><br />Sure, Microsoft can't sue "Linux" and it certainly shouldn't sue the Linux Community. However, those companies that are using Linux to make a profit, particularly those who also expect to get paid or their own patents, should be considered fair game. TomTom has shown it's willing to sue its competitors to protect its innovations, so it's not like they can plead Free Software religion here. <br /><br />We need to make sure Microsoft can't stamp out competitors, but they should have a right to get compensated for their innovations.

[dumbspammers]

The patents cited in this suit are in at least 5 out of the 6 I examined, blatantly void by reason of prior art. If TomTom takes the suit all the way through court and challenges the patents, MS stands to lose a lot more than just the patents - they might be declared a "frivolous litigant" and be barred from filing patent suits.

[Natanael_l01]

The question is if Microsoft has created anything patentable. <br /> <br />There's this hypotethical man in these patents laws, this worker that knows the art, that is used as a base to figure out if something is an innovation or not - is the solution obvious to anybody that knows the art well? Within software, that question is unanswerable. If it is obvious, it's unpatentable. <br /> <br />Somebody that writes hardware drivers might now understand what a image editing application coder is doing, so you have to compare with somebody that does exactly the same thing instead of the average programmer. <br /> <br />An example: Storing drivers on a memory chip in a device, and installing it from the memory (that would act as an USB mass storage device) is something I've been thinking about. Never read about it anywhere, just thought about how to improve plug-and-play. <br /> <br />Then I read that Microsoft had patented it. Sseveral other people said they had been thinking about the same thing in blog comments, somebody said "isn't that how it works? I thought that was obvious". And somebody knew of prior art, a modem that did this ages ago. He posted a link to information about it. <br /> <br />The incentive of the patent here for the patenteer is monopoly, being able to keep prices up, not anything else. Without the "incentive" of patents, it would have been done anyway. Oh, wait - it IS done already. <br /> <br />What has MS done that haven't been done before? Taking the tech to the masses? <br /> <br />Patents are only discouraing for the masses to invent, only the big ones make money out of it. <br /> <br />The right to get compensated is not the only incentive for invention, inventions will be made anyway. <br />Just take a look at open source software I'm really not using Windows Vista on my laptop anymore, I'm just booting Ubuntu Linux. It's both better and more fun. And I have the legal right to improve it and fix bugs in it, while on Windows I can get sued for messing with the GUI to fit my needs.

[RighteousSoutherner]

Oh, I predicted this long ago. As soon as Linux starts touching Microsoft profits or eating their lunch, they will begin to enforce patents both directly and indirectly against Linux. This is one the main inherent dangers of using Linux or many open source programs for that matter. The open source fanatics have largely brushed off these warnings in their typical cavalier manner over the years, but will eventually come back to bite them in their rear end, and most likely soon with the downturn in the economy. <br /> <br />Chalk it all up to naivete on the part of open sourcers.

[3rdalbum]

Companies friendly to open-source have a reasonable war chest of patents too.<br /><br />Microsoft will wish it had never tried to enforce its legally-shaky FAT patent (it was revoked for a few years, did you know?). Every flash drive, every MP3 player, every GPS system, every digital camera, every external hard disk, and darn near every embedded computing device uses the Fat32 filesystem in some way or another; not to mention big operating system vendors like Apple, Sun, and IBM. If there's any danger of Fat32 becoming risky ground, every company that uses it from Boeing to Sony could join the fight.<br /><br />Unless, of course, Microsoft wants something else. In any case, it's not going to stop Linux developers and distributors, and it's certainly not going to stop Linux users.

[protagonistic]

As long as IBM is backing Linux MS will be very careful to avoid too many of these suits. IBM probably has as many if not more patents that MS could be construed to be infringing on. Why do you think MS was careful to avoid any really direct involvement in the SCO case. IBM may not be the 800 pound gorilla anymore, but they are not far from it and they have lots of money.<br /><br />Also, MS does not want to test a lot of these patents in court. they are shaky at best because of prior art. A lot of the patents would not stand up to that test. You might want to brush up on your history a bit before making unfounded claims like you have. But I could just chalk it up to naivete on the part of closed sourcers.

[jtjt145]

MICRO$OFT IS DESPICABLE! <br />Don't use any more, if you can.

[t8]

I try not to, but my employer uses MS Office, Windows, and Microsoft Keyboards and Mice.<br />But management is not very IT savvy.

[nigratruo]

Well, I have stopped using Microsoft Products 6 years ago and have lived happily ever after, no more dumb and pricy licencing fees, no more activation and a lot more freedom to fix any problem and do whatever I want with the software.<br />4 laptops, 2 Desktops and about 5 servers have received various Linux releases over the years, even my netbook runs much better with a up to date Linux (than the almost 10 years old XP, smell of old software wafting around it).<br />Microsoft has lost quite some revenue over this, especially because I don't recommend Windows to anybody. MS office gets replaced with OpenOffice, Outlook with Thunderbird, MSN messenger with Pidgin and Internet Exploder with Firefox. <br /><br />Microsoft does not care and has reached the state of fat dumb ignorance about its customers that every company reaches at one point when it is already full in decline. It has overlived its usefullness and is now the biggest roadblock in IT, not enabling and bringing technology further, but hindering it and slowing it down. Vista is a good example of this ignorance.<br /><br />And they deserve what it coming to them. They are totally ignored by the Opensource community and all people that now work with and on Linux. We have all used Windows at one point and have changed and unlike the Windows fans, we really do know what we talk about, since know BOTH OSes.