The U.S. Patent and Trade Office (PTO) on February 28, 2025, rescinded former PTO Director Kathi Vidal's June 21, 2022, memorandum (Memorandum) addressing discretionary denial of inter partes review (IPR) of patents that are...more
As discussed in a previous post, in 2022, the Quantum Computing Cybersecurity Preparedness Act ordered an examination of federal administrative agencies' data cryptography to prepare for a future where quantum computing is...more
Generative artificial intelligence (AI) has the remarkable ability to develop novel solutions to problems, and patent law has historically protected those solutions. Under current statutes and jurisprudence, however, only...more
12/7/2023
/ Artificial Intelligence ,
Biden Administration ,
Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA) ,
Executive Orders ,
Google ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Inventions ,
Inventors ,
Machine Learning ,
Patent Act ,
Patents ,
Popular ,
Trade Secrets ,
USPTO
Generative artificial intelligence (AI) first performs broad, deep training on human-created materials, then, when given a prompt, can produce "original" works as output. Examples include ChatGPT (text), Stable Diffusion...more
In the waning days of 2022 and the 117th Congress, President Biden signed H.R.7535, the Quantum Computing Cybersecurity Preparedness Act, into law. The law recognizes the future threat that quantum decryption poses to federal...more
1/17/2023
/ Administrative Agencies ,
Cryptography ,
Cybersecurity ,
Data Protection ,
Decryption ,
National Security ,
New Legislation ,
NIST ,
OMB ,
Popular ,
Technology
Every portion of a home relies on a solid foundation. If that foundation fails, then everything above it could also be compromised. Many systems work this way: There are one or more critical elements that act as their...more
The Patent Act requires patentees to mark their products with the numbers of any patents that cover that product. Put differently, if you produce a product that would infringe one of your patents, you must mark that product...more
In recent years, constructs that were traditionally the domain of governments have found analogues in the metaverse. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are stand-ins for government-backed fiat currency. Non-fungible tokens...more
The metaverse provides new opportunities to engross consumers in branded environments. A brand can, for example, produce an entire curated, virtual world for the consumer to explore. As a real-world analogy, such virtual...more
So much of our lives is reliant upon computing, and quantum computing has the potential to upend the encryption we rely upon, as well as scientific fields of study. This post explores this exciting, entirely new form of...more
The Metaverse Standards Forum (MSF) was announced on June 21, 2022. The MSF aims to "foster interoperability standards for an open metaverse," and its existence could accelerate developing metaverse technologies. This post...more
If patent holders want to exclude others from using their invention, then they need to keep an eye on the marketplace to spot infringers. Because the metaverse opens up a new, virtual and potentially endless space where...more
8/23/2022
/ 3D-Automation ,
Blockchain ,
Cryptocurrency ,
Metaverse ,
Method Claims ,
Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) ,
Patent Act ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patents ,
Software ,
Virtual Reality
In our first post, we discussed the scope of trade secret protection, as well as how a trade secret is established and enforced. In this second post, we discuss trade secret “hygiene” – that is, best practices for maintaining...more
Congratulations! Your startup is developing a revolutionary product or service that has the potential to transform an industry. Whatever the nature of that new product or service, at its core is an innovation – perhaps an...more
You strap on a bizarre-looking headset that blankets your ears and eyes, pick up a controller in each hand, and within seconds are transported to a three-dimensional, virtual world inhabited by other people who are sharing...more
Blockchains are the Doritos Locos Taco of computer science. Complex as software can become, there are a limited number of tools available to software developers. Software developers combine arrays, databases, objects,...more
If you send your computer-generated MacGyver episode ideas to the production company, it is unlikely to review them. When companies do solicit creative ideas from the general public, they will likely require a signed...more
When I was in high school, the seniors would pull a prank in the late spring after college acceptance letters came in. It usually involved animals. The class above us released crickets in the lunchroom; another class set up...more
After reading an earlier IP/Decode post about hashing, my friend Jenny Rossman reached out to explain how law enforcement was using hash values to fight the spread of child pornography. For over a decade, Jenny had been a sex...more
Developing new creative ideas can be a challenge. Even in legal practice, where our writing is frankly less creative than in other fields, we have all stared at that blinking cursor while we try to imagine a killer opening...more
A few years ago, I inadvertently offended an artist friend of mine. We were discussing whether computers would ever generate art that matched what humans could create. She took the position that machines cannot "create"...more
When defending a patent-infringement case, attorneys primarily focus on two avenues of defense. First, they argue that the accused product does not infringe the patent's claims. For example, the claim may require a hybrid car...more
"You're storing the passwords in plaintext?" My college professor looked at me puzzled. I had to immediately fix this. It was a huge security problem in my senior project, a web-based e-commerce platform. If any hacker tapped...more
Like a lot of kids growing up in the 1980s, Nintendo was a big part of my childhood. A game that stands out for a lot of us is the original Legend of Zelda. That game put you in a very large, 8-bit world where you roamed...more
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are having a moment. In March 2021, Beeple sold an NFT of digital art for $69.3 million; in May 2021, The New York Times sold an NFT of a column for $560,000. But what are you really buying when you...more