Apple sued for iMessage and FaceTime security patent infringement patent

A Finnish company is suing Apple for patent infringement with its iMessage and FaceTime services and a VPN implementation. In total, Apple would infringe on eight of the company’s patents.

The Finnish company from Espoo, MPH Technologies, holds several patents related to securing communications, including ‘Method and System for Sending a Message Through a Secure Connection’ and ‘Method and Network for Ensuring Secure Forwarding of Messages’. The company contacted Apple in 2016 with an offer to license the technology described in the patents. Apple would use the techniques in FaceTime and iMessage on iOS, macOS and watchOS, among others. In addition, these would be incorporated in Apple’s implementation of the IKEv2 Mobility and Multihoming Protocol for VPN.

Apple showed interest in the offer, but after a while relied on ‘prior art’. So it would not be about new technology and Apple continued to use the techniques without a license. Apple did not provide proof that there was prior art, according to MPH. According to MPH, the techniques were originally devised by the Finnish company Netseal, founded in 1996, and have become widely accepted by the mobile industry, including for mobile VPN use over unsecured networks. MPH now wants compensation for the use of the technology and a ban on its further use, AppleInsider writes.