# Current Status ECDSA Patents

## wswartzendruber

Whatever came of Certicom claiming at least one patent in ECDSA?

----------

## John R. Graham

Alas, the educated believe is that at least some of the Certicom patents have teeth.

- John

----------

## wswartzendruber

So what, avoid it?

----------

## John R. Graham

For commercial use without careful review, yes. For personal or educational use, heck no. Our commercial products that use ECC will be under an impenetrable legal umbrella.

Incidentally, right now I happen to be working through two of the most abstruse textbooks I've ever studied to bolster my understanding of the math behind ECC:Abstract Algebra, by Dummit & Foote, and

Guide to Elliptic Curve Cryptography, by Hankerson, Mendez, & VanstoneECC is conceptually a lot more complicated than RSA, although there are great rewards in key length (shorter ECC keys are as secure as longer RSA keys) and performance (general purpose CPUs execute ECC operations much faster than RSA operations on keys of equivalent strength).

- John

----------

## khayyam

 *John R. Graham wrote:*   

> Alas, the educated believe is that at least some of the Certicom patents have teeth.

 

john ... I'm not so sure, its one thing to patent an implimentation but another to patent its mathematical representation, and I think (from the evidence presented in the Sony case, which indcidently Sony won) there is prior art. From what I understand Certicom has been playing 'kleine münze' with the hope that all the small 'use of ones and zeros for the purpose of ...' add up to one big 'claim'. They have over 100 patents now, most of which as in the form of 'the use of ECC for ...' and these amount to little more than desperate posturing (though, admittedly its the kind of posturing that finds its way to aquiring patents .. sigh).

best ... khay

----------

## John R. Graham

I'm okay with, "I'm not so sure."   :Wink:  However, in a commercial venture, you have to be cognizant of your potential liability.

- John

----------

## khayyam

 *John R. Graham wrote:*   

> I'm okay with, "I'm not so sure."  :wink: However, in a commercial venture, you have to be cognizant of your potential liability.

 

john ... yes, and unfortunately thats what it comes down to ... who has the bigger gun ... or equivelant: lawyers.

best ... khay

----------

## happy05

Your statement that Sony won is erroneous.  If you read the documents the case was removed or dismissed as the parties agreed to settle this out of court.  The exact language is, "Whereas Certicom and Sony have entered into a settlement agreement pursuant to which they have agreed to a dismissal without prejudice, these parties therefore jointly move to dismiss all claims and counterclaims asserted in this suit, without prejudice to the right to pursue any such claims and counterclaims in the future." 

It seems to indicate that Sony agreed to a settlement as they never overturned the patents.

----------

## khayyam

 *happy05 wrote:*   

> Your statement that Sony won is erroneous.  If you read the documents the case was removed or dismissed as the parties agreed to settle this out of court.  The exact language is, "Whereas Certicom and Sony have entered into a settlement agreement pursuant to which they have agreed to a dismissal without prejudice, these parties therefore jointly move to dismiss all claims and counterclaims asserted in this suit, without prejudice to the right to pursue any such claims and counterclaims in the future."

 

happy05 ... ok, so the case was "removed or dismissed", but as Certicom (as the plaintif) is asserting its patent right then that hardly counts as its validation. Such an "agreement" is not made public and so we can only speculate as to what it consists of, all we know is that both parties agreed to dismiss.

 *happy05 wrote:*   

> It seems to indicate that Sony agreed to a settlement as they never overturned the patents.

 

No, nothing is indicated, it could be equally as likely that Certicom backed out in order to preseve the appearance of its claim. Note also that Sony is the defendent, the onus is on the plaintifs claim, Sony is not in litigation for the purpose of "overturn[ing] the patents", but denying Certicom's assertion.

Anyhow, what is this ... a puppet account? You had to register here to necromance this thread for the purpose of setting the record straight? You don't happen to work for Certicom, or recieve payment from them, do you?

best ... khay

----------

## Hu

Settlements indicate only that the sides found a mutually agreeable solution that they considered more desirable than litigation.  It could be that the plaintiff decided the case was too weak to pursue or that the defendant decided to pay off the plaintiff to save the cost of litigating the dispute.  In some types of cases, it can be cheaper to pay off the other party than to spend the money and time to prove that you are right.

Overturning even egregiously bad patents is expensive enough that it is typically undertaken only when other options have been exhausted.  Per the comments higher in the thread, the patents in question may not be sufficiently bad that they could be overturned easily.

----------

