Facebook counter-sues Yahoo, patent war continues

PanARMENIAN.Net - Facebook has just taken strong aim back at Yahoo with a patent counter-lawsuit of its own, claiming infringement over a number of issues, AllThingsD reported.

“From the outset, we said we would defend ourselves vigorously against Yahoo’s lawsuit, and today we filed our answer as well as counter-claims against Yahoo for infringing ten of Facebook’s patents,” said Ted Ullyot, General Counsel of Facebook.

“While we are asserting patent claims of our own, we do so in response to Yahoo’s short-sighted decision to attack one of its partners and prioritize litigation over innovation.”

In its counter claims, involving 10 patents held by Facebook, the social networking giant said that Yahoo is infringing via a wide range of its services, including its homepage, content optimization, relevance engine, Flickr photo-sharing service and advertising throughout the service.

The new filing could not come at a worse time for Yahoo, which will announce thousands of layoffs of employees on April 4 morning, in a wrenching restructuring to revive its lackluster business, the report says.