Netflix, Disney, Hulu targeted in streaming suits
Netflix, Disney, Hulu, and others have come under fire from a New Jersey company alleging that their video-on-demand services infringe video streaming patents.
WAG Acquisition has filed a slew of complaints against the streaming giants this month in both the US District Court for the Central District of California and the Western District of Texas.
The complaints are uniform, claiming that WAG’s predecessor SurferNETWORK invented and patented technology at the heart of the streaming company’s services.
The asserted patents—US patents 9,742,824, 9,762,636, and 9,729,594—are titled “Streaming Media Delivery System” and were issued in August 2017, with expiry dates in 2028.
WAG Acquisition claims that the patents create a solution for internet video buffering, providing instant media playback when a video is played. It achieves this by pre-collecting video data at a faster speed than the video playback.
According to the complaint, the code found in the online media players also “receives requested media elements over a data connection having a data rate more rapid than the playback rate”.
Lawsuits against Hulu, Netflix, and Disney were filed on October 18, while the WACO complaints against YouTube and Amazon were filed on October 6.
WAG Acquisition has asked the courts to find that the video streaming services infringe the three patents and award damages.
Streaming services are increasingly popular targets for patent infringement suits over the past few years. Currently, Netflix, Google, and Amazon are embroiled in several lawsuits with Personalized Media Communications over unauthorised patent usage.
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