Re: [TLS] Document Action: 'TLS Elliptic Curve Cipher Suites with SHA-256/384 and AES Galois Counter Mode' to Informational RFC

[Dean Anderson <dean at av8.com>]

And by the way, if you really do want to dispute the patent status,
_you_ have to sit down with all 26 patents, go through every claim, and
show that each claim is either not overlapped in the draft, or invalid
through prior art.

One can't ignore a patent simply because you think that is too much work
for _the_infringer_ to do, or that the patent holder has to _prove_
something before the patent applies to the _infringer_. The patent
holder only has show to the court that the patent claims overlap the
infringer's work. And if the infringer can't prove there is no overlap
or invalidate the claims, then patent holder is _entitled_ to get
penalties, restitution, injunction [Well, that is, absent some egregious
conduct by the patent-holder, such as fraud on a standards body, as
happened in a court case involving a patented ITU standard]. Intentional
violation of a patent is a criminal offense that is prosecuted on people
who know of the patent but infringe anyway; its a crime in order to
deter people from doing that.


		--Dean

On Mon, 30 Jun 2008, Dean Anderson wrote:

> On Sat, 28 Jun 2008, Dan Harkins wrote:
> 
> > 
> > 
> > On Sat, June 28, 2008 12:19 pm, Dean Anderson wrote:
> > >                                                      There is no
> > > disclosure for this draft, even though the authors knew the algorithms
> > > were patented.
> > 
> >   What's the patent then? And please don't just regurgitate Certicom's
> > list of patents it asserts are necessary. For you to make such a specific
> > statement ("the algorithms were patented") you must know which specific
> > claim in what specific patent applies. So, what is it?
> 
> There is already general agreement that the RFC4492 algorithms are
> patented, and covered by 26 patents. The algorithms in the current draft
> are derived from those in RFC4492.  Derived algorithms are covered by
> the patent on the original algorithms.  It is up to you to prove that
> these new algorithms are NOT derived from the patented algorithms. Given
> the obvious derivation, you can't show the current algorithms to be
> original, and thus have no reason to doubt their patent status.
> 
> I also note that Rescorla's 2001 TLS book has a paragraph on Elliptic
> Curve cipher suites. In the book, Rescorla describes the patent status
> as vague and notes the cipher itself may be patented. It seems that 7
> years is plenty of time to get clarity. In fact, there seems to be some
> greater clarity on the patent status since 2001. But in any case, one
> can't pretend to be uncertain forever.  
> 
> 
> 		--Dean
> 
> 

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