<story><title>Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls</title><url>https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/09/senate-vote-tomorrow-could-give-helping-hand-patent-trolls</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>AlbertCory</author><text>Former tech advisor to Google Patent Litigation here.&lt;p&gt;The Ex Parte Reexamination is a fundamental tool for fighting against patent trolls:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Reexamination&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Reexamination&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;They &lt;i&gt;can&lt;/i&gt; also be used by big companies to steal IP from small inventors. However, this is not why the backers of this bill are trying to limit them.&lt;p&gt;When a troll buys up a patent from the early 2000&amp;#x27;s, they hope to stretch its claims, with the help of a patent-friendly judge, to cover some modern technology. Naturally, it&amp;#x27;s the FAANG and other big companies they really want, but first they build up a war chest by settling with smaller fish.&lt;p&gt;Filing an IPR is a cheaper way than going to trial for challenging these bogus patents, and believe me, nearly all software patents are bogus. I busted lots of them, including this:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.zdnet.com&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;microsoft-patent-may-block-google-maps-in-germany&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.zdnet.com&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;microsoft-patent-may-block-goo...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;If you go to trial, it&amp;#x27;s some unsophisticated jurors who decide if the patent is valid. For a reexam, it&amp;#x27;s PTO people, who at least know what the law is.&lt;p&gt;So that&amp;#x27;s why trolls want to get rid of reexams: to force companies to negotiate with them.</text></comment>
<story><title>Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls</title><url>https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/09/senate-vote-tomorrow-could-give-helping-hand-patent-trolls</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>dctoedt</author><text>Inactive patent lawyer here (these days my practice is in other areas).&lt;p&gt;1. This bill doesn&amp;#x27;t appear to address &lt;i&gt;Alice&amp;#x2F;Mayo&lt;/i&gt; unpatentability under 35 USC § 101. &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;bill&amp;#x2F;118th-congress&amp;#x2F;senate-bill&amp;#x2F;2220&amp;#x2F;text&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;bill&amp;#x2F;118th-congress&amp;#x2F;senate-bill&amp;#x2F;222...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;2. My concern is that this bill seems to inappropriately raise the evidentiary bar for a patent challenger to prove invalidity in an &lt;i&gt;inter partes&lt;/i&gt; review in the USPTO:&lt;p&gt;- Existing law, at 35 USC § 316(e) says a challenger in an IPR must prove invalidity by a preponderance of the evidence.  &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.law.cornell.edu&amp;#x2F;uscode&amp;#x2F;text&amp;#x2F;35&amp;#x2F;316&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.law.cornell.edu&amp;#x2F;uscode&amp;#x2F;text&amp;#x2F;35&amp;#x2F;316&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;(In a &lt;i&gt;court&lt;/i&gt; challenge to validity, the Supreme Court has ruled that invalidity must be proved by clear and convincing evidence, the highest standard in civil litigation, just short of beyond a reasonable doubt.)&lt;p&gt;- Section 4 of this amendment, when it comes to issued claims, would raise the IPR challenger&amp;#x27;s burden to clear and convincing evidence. For new claims, the challenger would &lt;i&gt;still&lt;/i&gt; have the burden of proof, but by a preponderance.&lt;p&gt;Both standards are bad public policy, because in most cases a single, very-busy patent examiner is in effect making national industrial policy — and granting the patent applicant a nationwide monopoly on the claimed subject matter — all by his- or her lonesome after doing a prior-art search; the applicant must disclose material information known to him&amp;#x2F;her but is under no obligation to do a search. That&amp;#x27;s been the law for a long time.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;d be as if a graduate school made a rule that a Ph.D. candidate &lt;i&gt;must&lt;/i&gt; be issued the degree unless his (or her) dissertation committee does a literature search and shows that the candidate&amp;#x27;s research wasn&amp;#x27;t sufficiently novel.  (As I understand it, every reputable Ph.D.-granting institution requires &lt;i&gt;the candidate&lt;/i&gt; to do a literature search to demonstrate novelty.)&lt;p&gt;But of course it&amp;#x27;s worse than that, because — unlike a new patent holder — a newly-minted Ph.D. can&amp;#x27;t weaponize his- or her dissertation to try to &amp;quot;extract&amp;quot; royalties from other researchers.</text></comment>