Google, YouTube, Yahoo countersue Xerox over patents

16 Apr 2010

Google and its subsidiary YouTube, along with Yahoo, have countersued Xerox, accusing the firm of infringing patents on internet searches.

Google, YouTube and Yahoo, who are defendants in the patents case brought by Xerox, have sought declarations that they did not infringe two patents that are at issue and because the patents are invalid cannot be enforced by Xerox.

Xerox sued Google, YouTube and Yahoo in February, claiming that services like Google Maps, YouTube and AdSense, as well as tools like Yahoo Shopping, infringed two patents that date back to 2001.

Xerox claims its patents cover technology such as a system for generating queries for information relating to a document, methods to integrate information from documents and other such data.

The document management company is seeking compensation for past infringements, as well as a ban on the defendants’ use of the technology.

By John Kennedy

Photo: Google, YouTube and Yahoo are denying that they have infringed two Xerox patents

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com