Facebook Sues BlackBerry Over Alleged Voice Messaging Patent Infringement

Facebook has slapped BlackBerry with a lawsuit accusing it of patent infringement. The legal spat follows BlackBerry's own lawsuit against Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp over allegations of "mobile messaging intellectual property" infringement, an issue that has boiled over into Facebook's own complaint. In it, the social media company claims BlackBerry has violated some of its voice messaging patents, among other things.

Facebook's legal complaint against BlackBerry is 118-pages long, according to Bloomberg, which reports that BlackBerry is accused of violating half a dozen patents covering technology that involves voice messaging, GPS data, and mobile media delivery.

Facebook's lawsuit follows a similar suit filed by BlackBerry against the company back in March. In it, BlackBerry accused Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram of infringing upon its mobile messaging patents. The company claimed that it had spent years in talks with Facebook over this alleged infringement without progress.

BlackBerry's lawsuit claimed that Facebook's messaging products had co-opted BlackBerry's own "innovations," among them being "security, user interface, and functionality enhancing features" found in BlackBerry products.

Multiple messaging products, including Facebook Messenger, Workplace Chat, Pages Manager, WhatsApp Messenger, and Instagram, among others, were accused of infringing BlackBerry patents. The company hasn't responded to Facebook's own lawsuit at this time.

SOURCE: Bloomberg