U.K. telco EE will block pirate music sites and apps on its mobile network, the British Phonographic Industry said Tuesday. High Court rulings over the past decade against the country's main fixed broadband providers, the BT Group (of which EE is a part), Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin Media, led to the blocking of over 70 illegal sites and apps. EE's move extends that to mobile networks and is a "significant development," said BPI, which estimates online piracy costs the recording industry 200 million pounds ($237 million) a year.

Advanced Micro Devices wants the International Trade Commission to partially terminate the Tariff Act Section 337 investigation into its allegations that TCL smart TVs and Realtek graphics processing unit chips infringe five of its patents on GPU circuitry architecture (see 2206060040), said an AMD motion Monday in docket 337-TA-1318. It’s withdrawing infringement allegations against one of the patents (8,760,454) but letting stand the assertions against the other four, said the motion, which TCL and Realtek didn’t oppose. Withdrawal of some of the allegations will “simplify” the investigation and “conserve judicial and private party resources,” said AMD. It's seeking cease and desist and limited exclusion orders against the allegedly infringing TCL and Realtek goods.

The Administrative Conference of the U.S. (ACUS) extended to Aug. 26 the deadline for comments in an independent study it's doing for the Patent and Trademark Office about creating a small claims patent court, said a notice for Tuesday’s Federal Register. The study will generate a report to Congress on whether there’s a need for a small claims patent court and the "feasibility and potential structure" of such a court, plus “the relevant legal, policy, and practical considerations" involved, said an ACUS notice May 3. Concerns have been raised for decades “that the high cost of patent litigation deters small- and medium-sized enterprises, including those owned by traditionally under-represented groups, from seeking to enforce their patents,” said the notice.

A federal grand jury in Newark, New Jersey, indicted a Florida man Thursday on charges of running a trafficking operation that imported more than $1 billion in fraudulent and counterfeit Cisco networking devices since 2014, said DOJ Friday. Onur Aksoy, 38, of Miami, ran at least 19 companies formed in New Jersey and Florida, plus more than two dozen Amazon and eBay online storefronts, that imported the devices from China and Hong Kong and resold them in the U.S., falsely claiming the goods were new, said DOJ. The imported devices were older, lower-end goods that had been sold or discarded but later modified by Chinese counterfeiters to look like newer and more expensive Cisco products. The counterfeiters added pirated Cisco software and unreliable components to defeat measures that Cisco embedded in the software to enforce license compliance, said DOJ. Efforts to reach Aksoy's lawyers Friday were unsuccessful.

Comments are due July 18 in docket 337-3626 at the International Trade Commission on the public interest issues raised by the cease and desist and limited exclusion orders VideoLabs seeks in a Tariff Act Section 337 complaint against devices from Acer, Asus, Lenovo, Micro-Star, Motorola Mobility and MSI for allegedly infringing four of its patents, says a notice for Friday’s Federal Register. Three of the patents involve H.264 and H.265 video compression. The fourth describes a method for readjusting a screen’s orientation when a portable device is rotated for different viewing positions, said the complaint. The presence of “an adequate supply of substitute products,” if the limited exclusion order is granted, “overrides any supposed public interest concerns,” said VideoLabs.

Administrative Law Judge Cameron Elliot at the International Trade Commission set Oct. 2, 2023, as the target date for completing the Tariff Act Section 337 investigation into allegations in a Broadband iTV April 22 complaint that set-top boxes from Comcast, Charter and Altice infringe four VOD and electronic program guide patents (see 2204280027), said an order he signed Tuesday in docket 337-TA-1315. Elliot’s order has five days of hearings scheduled to begin Feb. 6, and his initial determination in the case is to be ready by June 2.

Comments are due July 29 in docket 227-TA-1263 at the International Trade Commission on the public interest ramifications of the relief recommended by Administrative Law Judge MaryJoan McNamara against remote controls from Altice, Charter, Universal Electronics and WideOpenWest for infringing two Roku patents on universal remotes, said a notice for Wednesday’s Federal Register. McNamara’s June 28 initial determination recommending the sanctions in the Tariff Act Section 337 investigation remains temporarily confidential, but Roku’s April 2021 complaint sought limited exclusion and cease and desist orders against the infringing devices.

News organizations have “significant” copyright protections under current law, and the “challenges of funding journalism in the internet era do not appear to be copyright-specific,” the Copyright Office reported Thursday. The CO delivered the report at the request of Senate Intellectual Property Subcommittee Chair Patrick Leahy, D-Vt.; ranking member Thom Tillis, R-N.C.; and Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas; Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii; Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.; and Chris Coons, D-Del. The CO studied press publisher protections and evaluated the viability of EU-like protections that would allow media to demand payment for “third-party online uses of their news content, specifically from large news aggregators,” the CO said. The office doesn’t believe it has been proven that “any shortcomings in copyright law pose an obstacle to incentivizing journalism or that new copyright-like protections would solve the problems that press publishers face.” The CO doesn’t recommend “adopting a new ancillary copyright to bolster press publishers’ protections.” The report confirms what Re:Create, small publishers, consumers, libraries and academics have been saying: “a link tax or other ancillary copyright protections are not necessary, effective or constitutional,” said Re:Create Executive Director Joshua Lamel in a statement: All copyright-related policy options for supporting local journalism “must be off the table.” The report makes clear that copyright law isn’t the source or solution to journalism’s crisis, said Public Knowledge Senior Policy Counsel Meredith Rose: The report “helpfully notes that creating an ancillary right (such as a right to prevent outside linking to content) would go far beyond the bounds of existing copyright law, would likely be unable to accommodate basic free speech protections, and would otherwise raise constitutional concerns.” “There’s no question that objective journalism is a public good and critical to informing voters, so we appreciate the Copyright Office’s conclusion that new, European-style regulations are not necessary given existing copyright protections for news content,” said Computer and Communications Industry Association President Matt Schruers. "We were pleased that the Copyright Office recognized that the central issue is about lack of bargaining power with the dominant platforms," said News Media Alliance General Counsel Danielle Coffey. "However, they didn’t commit to a solution and that’s where Congress has stepped in," she said.

The Customs and Border Protection ruling that some Google device imports continue to infringe Sonos multiroom audio patents in violation of the International Trade Commission’s Jan. 6 limited exclusion order (see 2201100021) “temporarily impacts a small number of Pixel users who set up a speaker or display for the first time with the Device Utility App,” emailed a Google spokesperson Tuesday. “We will work with them to minimize disruption" as Google complies with CBP's orders to disable the app, he said. "Our support teams are on hand to fix any issues they have and if needed, we will send replacement devices or offer a Google store credit." Google has worked hard over the years to be sure that the customers it shares with Sonos "would have a positive experience," said the spokesperson. Google is "disappointed that Sonos continues to use the legal system in a way that deliberately creates issues for these users,” he said. Sonos publicists emailed journalists with links to the CBP ruling, which was dated June 3 and released publicly Tuesday, along with a statement from Sonos Chief Legal Officer Eddie Lazarus accusing Google of “flouting” the ITC’s import ban. “This finding marks yet another example of Google continuing to misuse our intellectual property and acting in wholesale disregard of the law,” said Lazarus.

The International Trade Commission terminated a Tariff Act Section 337 investigation into allegations that smart thermostats from ecobee, Google and others infringed five EcoFactor patents, said a notice for Tuesday’s Federal Register. Commissioners voted Wednesday to uphold an initial determination by Administrative Law Judge Cameron Elliot that found no Section 337 violation, it said. They agreed with Elliot’s finding that EcoFactor failed to establish infringement or validity of all the patents at issue, it said.