PACid Technologies, a tech firm from the US sued Samsung over a supposed infringement of its patent in a lawsuit taking place on 6th of April, in the Texas Eastern District Court. According to the firm Samsung has been illegally using its patented biometric features like fingerprints, facial recognition, iris scans, and user verification systems such as Samsung Pass and Samsung KNOX (in the latest Galaxy smartphones). This has apparently infringed upon U.S. Patent No. 9,577,993 and 9,876,771 and another South Korean patent, KR20110128567A.
If PACid wins, damages incurred by Samsung could be $3 billion. The said lawsuit will take into account the sales of Several Galaxy flagship models starting from the Galaxy S6 to the Galaxy S8. If proven that this infringement by Samsung was deliberate, it will have to pay a minimum of three times the damage amount of each unit sold. According to PACid, Samsung had prior knowledge of the patents since January 2017.
While this event of major companies being sued by remote firms is in no way new, as the US has seen many baseless lawsuits based on vague patents and loose interpretations, these are jokingly known as patent trolls, and PACid is an old player in this game. It has prior records of lawsuits against major companies like Google, Apple, and Nintendo, which actually develop and sell products. Some shady firms want to take advantage of the existing laws to make a profit if by any slim chance, they happen to win the lawsuit.
As for Samsung, it has a history of varied patent infringement lawsuits over time, the most well-known being the long-drawn trials against Apple about design patents in the US, as well as a legal battle with Huawei in China over an infringement of 4G patents held by Huawei — facing several setbacks in both cases.
