GTL’s biometric security patent deemed valid, paves way to request restart of $100M infringement lawsuit

Global Tel*Link (GTL) announced that the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed the decision of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) validating all claims of GTL patent 7,853,243, which paves the way for GTL to request a Texas Federal judge to restart a $100 million infringement lawsuit against Securus Technologies.

The move comes more than seven months after the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) ruled in favor of Securus Technologies regarding GTL’s patent invalidation filing.

The patents cover technology for biometric and voice validation of inmate calls, which is widely-used feature in inmate calling systems and a requirement in many U.S. county jails and state prisons.

The lawsuit, initially filed against Securus in October of 2013, involves US patent No. 7,853,243 as well as GTL patents 7,783,021 and 7,551,732, which relate to call management and monitoring, use of Voice over IP communications for centralized call platforms, and operation and use of voice verification in inmate calling.

The unanimous Federal Circuit ruling affirmed an April 2016, PTAB final written decision that validated all challenged claims of the 7,853,243 patent that the PTAB agreed to review, some of which GTL has asserted against Securus as part of a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas.

The lawsuit alleges infringement by Securus’ “Secure Call Platform,” which manages nearly all of Securus’ telecommunications traffic. GTL seeks past damages and an injunction to prevent Securus from using the technology.

The case was stayed in 2015, pending the outcome of IPRs filed by Securus against all of the patents in suit. Unlike the majority of patents that are challenged before the PTAB, all of the asserted patents had all or some of their claims withstand their respective challenges.

GTL has never licensed to any competitor the technologies cited in its lawsuit against Securus and is therefore seeking an injunction that, if granted, would require Securus to cease using GTL’s patented technologies on its platforms at all facilities where infringement is occurring.

Securus initiated the patent litigation between the companies in 2013, filing an infringement suit against GTL, followed by two more infringement suits, while seeking $115 miilion from GTL to license Securus’ patents.

GTL said it believes that Securus does not have any viable patent claims against the company, and that every claim of the patents asserted by Securus from the first two lawsuits that GTL challenged has already been deemed invalid by the PTAB.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  lawsuit  |  patents  |  prisons  |  voice verification