Litigious CDNs
 
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The legal tangling continues among content delivery network providers. The latest salvo comes from Cable & Wireless, which last week filed suit against Akamai Technologies. C&W claims that Akamai is infringing on a patent that the British telecommunications firm was issued on July 2.
C&W says its U.S. patent covers various content delivery algorithms and systems that ensure that only the freshest information is served to Web sites and that content is not unnecessarily duplicated on the CDN. In its lawsuit, C&W claims that Akamai's CDN products, including EdgeSuite and the Akamaizer tool used to prepare content for delivery over the CDN, infringe on this newly issued patent.
Akamai says it's not so.
The new patent covers technology that "is just another version of the same so-called 'fingerprinting' technology that a jury previously determined Akamai does not infringe," Akamai President Paul Sagan said in a statement. "We are confident that Akamai does not infringe on the new patent."
Akamai claims that C&W's legal action is an effort to divert attention from the permanent injunction that a federal judge has agreed to grant against Digital Island's Footprint CDN service. (C&W acquired Digital Island last year, and the company has been integrated with Web hoster Exodus to form Exodus, a Cable & Wireless Service.)
Akamai says that permanent injunction is expected to be issued against C&W this summer. C&W, however, claims that the permanent injunction will have no effect on its operations since the technology in question is no longer used in the Digital Island CDN service.
The wrangling between Digital Island and Akamai goes back nearly two years. Akamai first sued Digital Island in September 2000, claiming it was infringing on Akamai patents. Since then, Akamai has also taken aim at fellow CDN Speedera Networks, which Akamai claims is also infringing on its technology patents.
RELATED LINKS
Network World Web Acceleration Newsletter, 07/01/02
Akamai wins permanent injunction against Digital Island
Network World Fusion, 07/02/02
Akamai sues Speedera
Network World Fusion, 02/14/02
Akamai aims to squash Digital Island's Footprint service
Network World Fusion, 01/17/02
Caching shake-up at Inktomi
Network World, 07/22/02
Denise Dubie is a Staff Writer covering network management at Network World. She also works as a freelance writer in the Boston area. You can reach her at ddubie@nww.com.
