1996-03-09 - Re: News on RSA vs. Cylink Injunctions and Patents

Header Data

From: Bill Stewart <stewarts@ix.netcom.com>
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Message Hash: 1c88566206677932e8f669864ffcb099760f7ea984da04645188b3b8562b732f
Message ID: <199603090543.VAA06458@ix14.ix.netcom.com>
Reply To: N/A
UTC Datetime: 1996-03-09 08:21:01 UTC
Raw Date: Sat, 9 Mar 1996 16:21:01 +0800

Raw message

From: Bill Stewart <stewarts@ix.netcom.com>
Date: Sat, 9 Mar 1996 16:21:01 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: News on RSA vs. Cylink Injunctions and Patents
Message-ID: <199603090543.VAA06458@ix14.ix.netcom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 10:06 AM 3/8/96 PST, "baldwin" <baldwin@RSA.COM (Robert W. Baldwin)> wrote:
>        The following press release from RSA may be of interest to the
>folks on this list.

Thanks!  It is of interest, but from one or two rounds of previous experience,
I'd not want to draw any conclusions from either RSA's or Cylink's press
releases
about the content or meaning of a given court decision.  They seem to inhabit
different and not-quite parallel universes.

>Cylink contends that RSA's software infringes its Stanford patents and that 
>licensing required an additional grant from Cylink, despite 
>the fact that RSA already has a license.  After hearing oral arguments on 
>Feb. 29, Judge Williams denied Cylink's motion from the bench and later 
>issued a written order explaining that "several factors weigh against 
>finding that (Cylink) has shown a likelihood of success on 
>the merits."  

This sounds a lot like Cylink asked for a temporary restraining order
blocking sales of BSAFE until the resolution of a lawsuit, and the judge
rejected that request.  If the quotations mean the same in context
as they do in a press release (:-), they're moderately negative,
though not a total rejection of the main case.  It is pleasant to have
RSA on the side of breaking the D-H patent and limiting the scope of H-M.
Maybe this will help free the algorithms even before Roger Schlafly's suit does.

#--
#			Thanks;  Bill
# Bill Stewart, stewarts@ix.netcom.com, +1-415-442-2215 pager 408-787-1281
# "At year's end, however, new government limits on Internet access threatened
# to halt the growth of Internet use.  [...] Government control of news media 
# generally continues to depend on self-censorship to regulate political and
# social content, but the authorities also consistently penalize those who
# exceed the permissable."  - US government statement on China...






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