A years-old battle over the technology Apple uses in iTunes, App Store and Apple Music has a new development. On Friday, a federal jury in Texas declared that Apple had indeed infringed a patent for a digital rights management technology held by Personalized Media Communications. As a result, it ordered the tech giant to sell for about $ 308.5 million.
According to Bloomberg, Personalized Media Communications sued Apple over infringement of its FairPlay patent, a digital rights management technology used to encrypt encrypted content from Apple’s iTunes, App Store and Apple Music services, including patents, to distribute among other patents.
As explained by Personalized Media Communications, a file encrypted with FairPlay, such as a piece of media content or software app, is digitally encrypted and can only be decrypted by an authorized user device based on user-specific or device-specific decryption information.
The lawsuit dates back to 2015 and has been through many twists and turns. Although Apple successfully challenged the case at the U.S. Patent Office, Reuters reported, an appellate court later overturned the decision. And just last week, U.S. District Judge Rodney Gilstrap rejected Apple’s request to invalidate the Personalized Media Communication patent.
The jury trial and verdict are the latest developments, but will not be the last.
Apple said in a statement to Bloomberg that he was disappointed with the verdict and that he would appeal against it.
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“Cases like these, brought by companies that do not manufacture or sell products, stifle innovation and ultimately harm consumers,” Apple told Bloomberg.
An expert in personalized media communications has set a $ 240 million price tag for what Apple owes the company for using its technology. However, the jury ordered Apple to pay a running royalties, that is, the price determined by the sale of licensed products or processes.
Gizmodo asked Apple yesterday to comment on the matter, but he did not hear about it. We will make sure we update this blog if we do.
According to Bloomberg, Apple is not the only company that fights with personalized media communications over patents. The statement says that YouTube won a patent lawsuit against Personalized Media Communications over several patents last year. Meanwhile, the company has also sued Netflix.