PersonalWeb Techs. LLC v. Google LLC

PERSONALWEB TECHNOLOGIES LLC, Plaintiff, v. GOOGLE LLC, et al., Defendants.

PERSONALWEB TECHNOLOGIES LLC, Plaintiff, v. FACEBOOK INC., Defendant.

PERSONALWEB TECHNOLOGIES LLC, et al., Plaintiffs, v. EMC CORPORATION, et al., Defendants.

Case No. 5:13-cv-01317-EJD

Case No. 5:13-cv-01356-EJD

Case No. 5:13-cv-01358-EJD

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA SAN JOSE DIVISION

January 29, 2020

Re: Dkt. No. 361

Re: Dkt. No. 85

Re: Dkt. No. 78

ORDER GRANTING DEFENDANTS' MOTION FOR JUDGMENT ON THE PLEADINGS

Plaintiff PersonalWeb Technologies LLC owns a family of patents that claim methods for reliably identifying, locating, and processing data in a computer network. Plaintiff alleges that Defendants infringed three of these patents. Defendants argue that Plaintiff's patents are invalid pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 101. The Court finds this motion suitable for consideration without oral argument. See N.D. Cal. Civ. L.R. 7-1(b). Having considered the Parties' papers, the Court GRANTS Defendant's motion for judgment on the pleadings.

I. BACKGROUND

A. Factual Background

Plaintiff argues that Defendants (collectively or separately) infringed U.S. Patent No. ("the '310 patent"), No. 6,415,280 ("the '280 patent"), and No. 7,949,662 ("the '662 patent"). The three patents at issue are part of a larger family of patents that Plaintiff calls the "True Name" patents. The patents are aimed at combatting the problems of data storage on larger networks. As computer networking and storage systems evolve, files can be divided and stored across different devices in dispersed locations. This created problems—different users can unknowingly give identical names to identical files. The inventors of the "True Name" patents patented a solution; they developed a system that replaces conventional file names with unique content-based identifiers. This is done by applying a "hash function" (a mathematical algorithm) to the data in each file. For instance, as described in the '310 patent, an item's unique content creates a unique identifier. A myriad of data items can be used to create the unique identifier, which ensures duplicate copies are not created. See, e.g., '310 patent, (2:18-21) ("[A] data item may be the contents of a file, a portion of a file, a page in memory, an object in an object-oriented program, a digital message, a digital scanned image, a part of a video or audio signal, or any other entity which can be represented by a sequence of bits."). The three patents acknowledge that the "True Name," i.e. the assigned identifier, is intended for use with "existing" operating systems and "standard" data-management processes. Id. (6:26).

The '310 Patent. The '310 patent explains a method and apparatus for creating a unique data-identifier for each file based on the content of the data item. The identifier is independent of the data item's user-defined name/location, which helps ensure duplicate copies are not created. The identifier for a particular data item is created by applying a cryptographic hash function to the data claim. The output of the hash function is the content-based identifier or "True Name," which is "virtually guaranteed" to be unique to the data item. PersonalWeb Techs., LLC v. Apple, Inc.,917 F.3d 1376, 1377-78 (Fed. Cir. 2019). The system uses the content-based identifier to determine whether a particular data item is present on the system. And, when the data item's contents are changed, the content-based identifier is also changed. The identifiers are then used to determine if access to a data item is licensed or authorized. See, e.g., '310 patent (claims 24, 81, 86).

Five claims of the '310 patent are at issue. Plaintiff contends Defendant EMC/VMware infringed claims 24 and 31 of the patent. Plaintiff alleges Defendants Google/YouTube, Facebook, and EMC/VMware infringed claims 81, 82, and 86 of the patent. The relevant claims of the '310 patent are as follows:

24. A computer-implemented method implemented at least in part by hardware comprising one or more processors, the method comprising:

(a) using a processor, receiving at a first computer from a second computer, a request regarding a particular data item, said request including at least a content-dependent name for the particular data item, the content-dependent name being based, at least in part, on at least a function of the data in the particular data item, wherein the data used by the function to determine the content-dependent name comprises at least some of the contents of the particular data item, wherein the function that was used comprises a message digest function or a hash function, and wherein two identical data items will have the same content-dependent name; and

(b) in response to said request:

(i) causing the content-dependent name of the particular data item to be compared to a plurality of values;

(ii) hardware in combination with software determining whether or not access to the particular data item is unauthorized based on whether the content-dependent name of the particular data item corresponds to at least one of said plurality of values, and

(iii) based on said determining in step (ii), not allowing the particular data item to be provided to or accessed by the second computer if it is determined that access to the particular data item is not authorized.

31. The method of claim 21¹ wherein, for each particular data item of the plurality of dataitems, the corresponding content-dependent name for that particular data item was based on a function of all of the contents of that particular data item.

81. A device operable in a network of computers, the device comprising hardware including at least one processor and memory, to:

(a) receive, at said device, from another device in the network, a content-based identifier for a particular sequence of bits, the content-based identifier being based at least in part on a function of at least some of the particular sequence of bits, wherein the function comprises a message digest function or a hash function, and wherein two identical sequences of bits will have the same content-based identifier, and to

(b) compare the content-based identifier of the particular sequence of bits to a plurality of values; and to

(c) selectively allow said particular sequence of bits to be provided to or accessed by other devices depending on whether or not said content-dependent identifier corresponds to one of the plurality of values.

82. The device of claim 81 wherein the particular sequence of bits represent data selected from the group comprising: a file, a portion of a file, a page in memory, a digital message, a portion of a digital message, a digital image, a portion of a digital image, a video signal, a portion of a video signal, an audio signal, a portion of an audio signal, a Software product, and a portion of a software product.

86. A device operable in a network of computers, the device comprising hardware, including at least one processor and memory, to:

(a) receive at said device, from another device in the network, a digital identifier for a particular sequence of bits, the digital identifier being based, at least in part, on a given function of at least some of the bits in the particular sequence of bits, wherein the given function comprises a message digest function or a hash function, and wherein two identical sequences of bits will have the same digital identifier; and

(b) selectively allow the particular sequence of bits to be provided to or accessed by other devices in the system, based at least in part on whether or not the digital identifier for the particular sequence of bits corresponds to a value in a plurality of values, each of theplurality of values being based, at least in part, on the given function of at least some of the bits in a corresponding sequence of bits.

The '280 Patent. The '280 patent addresses a method of identifying and requesting data in a network using content-based identifiers. Specifically, it covers a situation where data items are distributed across a network of servers and some of the data items are cached (stored) versions from a source server. The content delivery network ("CDN") determines a "True Name," i.e. a content-dependent identifier, for a particular data item (as in the '310 patent). In response to a request for a particular data item, the CDN provides the particular data item from one of the servers in the network of servers.

Four claims of the '280 patent are at issue. Plaintiff contends Defendants Facebook, Google, and YouTube infringed claims 15 and 16. Plaintiff alleges Defendant Facebook infringed claims 31 and 31. The relevant claims of the '280 patent are as follows:

15. A method as in claim 10²further comprising:

resolving the request for the particular data file based on a measure of availability of at least one of the servers.

16. A method as in claim 15 wherein the measure of availability is based on one or more of:

(a) a measurement of bandwidth to the Server;

(b) a measurement of a cost of a connection to the server, and

(c) a measurement of a reliability of a connection to the SCWC.

31. A content delivery method, comprising:

distributing a set of data files across a network of servers,

determining an MD5 hash of the contents of a particular data file; and

in response to a request for the particular data file, the request including at least the MD5 hash of the particular data file, providing the particular data file from a given one of the Servers of the network of Servers, Said providing being based on the MD5 hash of the particular data file.

32. A method as in claim 31 further comprising: resolving the request for the particular data file based on a measure of availability of at least one of the servers.

The '662 Patent. The '662 patent addresses the de-duplication of data in a data-processing system. The invention describes systems and methods for deleting a particular copy of a data item when at least one other copy of the copy of the data item is...