Tech Law

The FCC indicated it will not approve LightSquared's network, as it would interfere with GPS signals used by planes, boats and cars throughout the U.S. The FCC's approval of LightSquared's plans was conditional on resolving those interference issues. LightSquared's high-speed network would have ser...

Google has cleared a significant hurdle in what will perhaps be its greatest prize yet: its $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility. The deal has gotten the green light from both U.S. and European regulators. Their approval did not come without some words of caution about making sure that cri...

Doug Whitman, a hedge fund manager with Whitman Capital, has been charged with insider trading of tech stocks by federal prosecutors. The Securities and Exchange Commission is also pursuing Whitman in a parallel civil case. Whitman surrendered to the Federal Bureau of Investigation on Friday, pled n...

Another government venue, another condemnation of LightSquared's planned 4G LTE network. U.S. Department of Transportation Deputy Secretary John Porcari told a congressional hearing on Wednesday that if LightSquared were to be deployed, the Federal Aviation Administration would have to constantly m...

The fallout from changes Google plans to make to its privacy policies and terms of service continues, with consumer advocacy group the Electronic Privacy Information Center suing the Federal Trade Commission over the issue. EPIC is seeking injunctive and other relief to force the FTC to enforce a co...

Oracle is clearly not prepared to let go of the TomorrowNow case involving corporate theft it suffered at the hands of the service provider, which was acquired by rival SAP in 2005. In a legal filing this week, Oracle rejected the $272 million in court-ordered damages from SAP. A jury found in favor...

Privacy continues to be in the headlines. Companies and governments are garnering and analyzing information that they obtain through means some find questionable in unprecedented ways. Recently, I wrote a column about Carrier IQ's business of allegedly tracking cell data. Many readers use Google...

Google has rejected the request of European regulators that it delay the implementation of its new privacy policies to give authorities time to review the changes and ensure that users' data will remain secure. The European Commission's Article 29 Working Party, an independent body of data privacy r...

Apple has suffered a setback in its multicountry, extremely complex, and seemingly everlasting patent fight with Samsung. In the latest episode, its request to ban Samsung from selling two devices in Germany -- its Galaxy Tab 10.1N tablet and its Galaxy Nexus smartphone -- was rejected by the Munich...

Google has responded to a letter from members of Congress with its own 13-page missive explaining changes to its privacy policy that will take effect on March 1. Among other things, the letter signed by eight legislators stated that "consumers should have the ability to opt out of data collection wh...

The European Union has begun looking into whether Samsung Electronics has engaged in antitrust behavior. Samsung years ago pledged to license its patents that are essential for the implementation of European mobile telephony standards on fair, reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms. However "it app...

The U.S. Attorney's Office handling the case against Megaupload and its founder Kim Dotcom and associates has informed the court it's OK to begin deleting the Megaupload data beginning on Feb. 2, according to press reports. The two storage companies that host Megaupload data are free to sweep their ...

Facebook and Washington state filed federal lawsuits on Thursday against Adscend Media for "clickjacking," a form of spamming that fools users into visiting advertising sites and divulging personal information. "Likejacking" is similar. Users believe links to spam sites are being sent to them by fri...

Intel is buying about 190 patents, 170 patent applications, and next-generation video codec software from RealNetworks. The terms of the sale will allow RealNetworks to retain certain rights to continue using the patents in current and future products. In addition to the sale, RealNetworks and Intel...

Motorola Mobility has filed yet another lawsuit accusing Apple of infringing several of its patents for wireless antennae, software, data filtering and messaging technologies. The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida this week, follows a similar lawsuit Motorol...