Vonage was found guilty of violating three patents held by Verizon. But what exactly do those patents cover? Here’s a more detailed look.

The three patents held by Verizon fall under the umbrella of business method patents, which are patents designed to protect a process.

Two of the patents define the process of supporting VoIP traffic and how it’s handled on the traditional Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN). The third patent, also a method patent, covers wireline to Wi-Fi VoIP support.

Specifically, U.S. Patent 6,282,574 covers packet translation and how a service provider would encode IP packets so they can be ported over to the PSTN. It details the way addresses are processed on the domain name server by providing a name server for translating textual domain names into telephone numbers. The patent also describes how to support “name-to-address processing” on a name server based on specific parameters such as time, party or terminal making the request.

The packet-translation technology patent application was filed in 2000 by then Bell Atlantic with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. For more detailed information on the patent, check out the full document on the agency’s Web site.

U.S. Patent 6,104,711, which Bell Atlantic filed for in 1997, covers how a carrier can support Advanced Intelligent Network (AIN) features, typical in PSTN services for VoIP customers. These features include call waiting, caller ID and three-way calling. The patent maps out how the “enhanced Internet domain name server” allows the Internet to communicate with a separate AIN to support these features for VoIP customers.

The patent text can be found here.

The third patent -- U.S. Patent 6,359,880, which was applied for in 1999 -- covers how public wireless and cordless Internet gateways communicate with the Internet. It falls under another business method patent that details a localized wireless gateway system.

The patent details how a local wireless gateway can be used to support VoIP calls. It describes how calls can be transferred from the Internet to a wireless gateway at a customer’s location to support the call on a Wi-Fi or other public domain wireless spectrum. The patent document is here