Facebook, Instagram and Snap sued over GPS patents
Social media sites Facebook and Instagram have been accused of infringing several patents relating to GPS technology belonging to Texas-based Corrino Holdings.
The lawsuits were filed separately at the US District Court for the Central District of California on Thursday, October 4. In two separate suits filed there on the same day, Corrino alleged that Snap, the parent company of Snapchat, and mobile app Foursquare have infringed some of the same patents.
Instagram, a subsidiary of Facebook, was accused of infringing US patent numbers 6,353,398; 7,843,331; 7,982,599; 7,525,450; and 7,716,149. In addition to these patents, Facebook was accused of infringing the 7,847,685; 7,958,104; 9,262,533; and 9,767,164 patents.
The patents in question relate to technology that notifies users of nearby services or allows them to search for services within a geographical range.
For example, the ‘398 and ‘331 patents, called “System for dynamically pushing information to a user utilising global positioning system”, is a method that provides region-specific information.
According to the claim, the ‘398 patent was created to provide more detailed geographical information than a regular GPS system by telling the user what services are nearby.
The abstract of both the ‘398 and ‘331 patents state: “The system locates and transmits information to location-specific users. A directed information system links information related to the location-specific users. The directed information system has access to a regionally defined database for directing region-specific information to location specific-users.”
Corrino alleged that Facebook has infringed the patents in question by offering apps for mobile phones and other devices that incorporate the technology.
The company also claimed that Instagram’s mobile app provides users with technology that infringes the patents.
Meanwhile, in its claim against Snap, Corrino alleged that the company’s Snapchat app infringes the ‘398, ‘331, ‘599, ‘450, ‘149 and ‘104 patents by providing a location-targeting service that provides the location of the user for local advertisers to target. Corrino is requesting damages in all four of the lawsuits.
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