Sony to pay $40m to end patent dispute
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Sony and Ampex have agreed to end their dispute over a patent covering thumbnail images in digital image storage and retrieval devices.
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Sony is facing another patent infringement suit, this time involving its Blu-ray high definition disc technology.
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(InfoWorld) - Sony BMG Music Entertainment will pay $1.5 million in penalties to settle lawsuits with two U.S. states over its controversial use of copy protection software. The settlements with the California and Texas attorneys general were announced Tuesday, seven months after theÂ music giant settled a class-action lawsuit in the matter. Sony's trouble began in late 2005, when a computer science researcher disclosed that Sony's had beenÂ shipping CDs with a copy protection program that used dangerous "rootkit" techniquesÂ to cloak itself after installation. Sony licensed this software from First 4 Internet Ltd., based in Banbury, U.K., but problems were also found with a second copy protection program used by Sony. That software, called Media Max, was developed by SunnComm International Inc. of Phoenix. Until Tuesday, Texas had been the only state with an outstanding lawsuit related to the rootkit fiasco, but other state's attorneys general and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission had also been looking into the matter, according to Jeff McGrath, deputy district attorney, with Los Angeles County, which participated in the California lawsuit. Sony has now reached tentative settlements with more than a dozen other states, including Massachusetts and Nebraska, as well as the FTC, McGrath said. The FTC declined to comment on the matter. The California lawsuit was both filed and settled on Tuesday. Sony's rootkit software shipped on an estimated 15 million CDs, bundled with music from artists such as Frank Sinatra, Celine Dion and Earl Scruggs. Consumers were offered refunds as part of the May class-action agreement, but Tuesday's settlements take additional steps by compensating them for damages caused by the rootkit code and "ensuring that this type of thing will not happen again," McGrath said. California and Texas consumers who believe that their computers were damaged by Sony's software can receive up to $175 to cover repair costs. The agreements also force Sony to submit any software it ships with music CDs to third-party audits for the next five years. Sony has created a Web site to address its rootkit settlement. That site is eventually expected to include instructions for consumers seeking refunds for their PC repairs. These refunds will, for example, compensate users who had their CD drives trashed when AOL's antispyware software tried to remove the First 4 files, said Paco Felici, a spokesman with the Texas Attorney General's office. Since the rootkit fiasco, Sony has stopped shipping digital rights management software with its music CDs. However, if it does add this capability to future CDs, it must make this clear to customers. "They're requiring disclosures to consumers before sale on the CD packaging," said Corynne McSherry, a staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "I think that's really crucial. Part of the whole background of the rootkit fiasco was that consumers just didn't know what they were getting into." A Sony spokesman declined to comment on investigations by the FTC and other states. "We are pleased to have reached agreements with the offices of the California and Texas Attorneys General," he said, reading from a statement.
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Wall Street banks Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have agreed to pay $40 million each to settle charges that they tried to manipulate the prices of hot IPO stocks, US regulators said yesterday.
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- Sony Computer Entertainment said it and  Immersion Corp.  agreed to end a patent litigation and  entered into an agreement to explore the inclusion of  Immersion's technology in Sony's PlayStation format products.
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Pfizer, the world&#39;s largest drug maker, agreed Friday to pay $430 million to resolve personal-injury claims against a subsidiary that sold products containing asbestos in the 1970s.
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A patent infringement lawsuit filed by AT&amp;T against voice-over-IP telephony provider-Vonage has been settled, Vonage said late Friday.The settlement brings an unusually speedy end to&#160;the lawsuit filed by AT&amp;T on Oct. 17. It alleged Vonage wilfully infringed an AT&amp;T patent related to telephone systems that allow people to make VOIP (voice-over-Internet Protocol) calls using standard telephone devices. A breakdown in talks between the two companies over the issue led to the lawsuit, AT&amp;T said&#160;at the time.Less than a month later, on Nov. 7, the two companies said they had&#160;tentatively agreed to a settlement. At that time Vonage said it would pay AT&amp;T around $39 million under the terms of the settlement.Final terms were not disclosed on Friday when, in a brief statement, Vonage said the dispute had been settled.Vonage previously&#160;settled a patent suit with Verizon&#160;for $80 million to $120 million, depending on the results of its appeal of a court ruling on two patents, and with Sprint Nextel for $80 million. As part of the Sprint Nextel deal Vonage agreed to license more than 100 patents covering technology for connecting calls from a traditional phone network to an IP network. The Verizon settlement came after a court found Vonage had infringed upon the carrier&#39;s patents.&#160;
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The Financial Times reported yesterday that Microsoft paid the Computer and Communications Industry Association $19.75 million earlier this month to settle an antitrust suit, and that the association&#39;s top official received $9.75 million of that amount.
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Samsung and Sony have signed a five-year cross-licensing agreement covering a wide range of patents for digital products. The agreement should reduce the potential for disputes
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Ampex and Sony have settled a patent dispute over digital-camera technology, Ampex said Monday. As part of the deal, Redwood City, Calif.
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Michael Jackson reached a settlement  on Monday with a New Jersey financial company that brought a  $48 million breach-of-contract lawsuit against him.
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Inks deal for ten years of patents Intel has agreed to stump up $250 to Transmeta to settle the patent dispute case between the firms without battling through the courts. Intel will pay its rival $150 in a lump sum, plus an annual license fee of $20m for the next five years.â¦
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There's a silver lining in every Blu-ray patent cloud Sony is facing legal action from a Californian company over claims of patent infringement in its use of Blu-ray technology in the PlayStation 3 games console.â¦
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Immersion Corp., a small California firm that develops and licenses touch-related technologies, has been awarded $82 million after winning a patent infringement lawsuit against PlayStation maker Sony Corp.
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Undisclosed payment over rights violation claim Microsoft has settled a long-running patent infringement suit with Eolas and the University of California in a case which has been running since 1999. Microsoft will make an undisclosed payment to Eolas.â¦
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TWO of the worldâs biggest electronics companies have hammered out a deal that should help keep them out of the courtroom. Japanese electronics icon Sony and South Korean rival Samsung, the worldâs leading
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Kodak and Sun Microsystems have reached a settlement in their patent dispute over Java technology, with Sun agreeing to fork over $92 million to settle the suit.