VeriSign Now Holds A Patent On SiteFinder

from the this-is-patentable? dept

Tue, May 6th 2008 4:20pm — Mike Masnick

Back in 2003, VeriSign kicked off quite a bit of controversy with its "SiteFinder" plans. SiteFinder would see that you were trying to go to a non-existent domain name, and rather than send you the proper error message, would send a bunch of ads instead. VeriSign, of course, claimed that this would be useful, as some of the ads might point you to where you really wanted to go. The problem, of course, was that it broke how the internet was supposed to work -- and certain applications relied on the fact that the internet would work the way it was originally designed. VeriSign eventually pulled the service, though others have reimplemented it, mostly at the ISP level rather than the DNS level. However, now, as Slashdot points out, it appears that VeriSign owns a patent on the concept. The patent was granted a few months ago, and VeriSign has control over it thanks to an acquisition. The real question, though, is why is this patentable? The reason it hadn't been done before wasn't because it was some great invention that needed the extra incentives of a patent -- it was because most people thought it was a bad idea.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: patents, sitefinder
Companies: verisign

9 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Anonymous Coward, 6 May 2008 @ 6:31pm

Well, generally we only get upset about these things when the idea is obvious and GOOD. But this idea is bad. So, let them hassle other bottom feeders who abuse the dns system.

unless--does anyone know how this could come back to haunt us?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Gray_hat, 6 May 2008 @ 6:33pm

On the flipside...
Hypothetically, if VeriSign were to sue any "infringers", would this not lead to a refuction in ISP and DNS level spam?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 6 May 2008 @ 9:13pm

Never met a patent they didn't like
Waiting for all the patent fan boys to show up and defend this.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Willton, 6 May 2008 @ 10:12pm

Why wouldn't it be patentable?
Just because some people thought it was a bad idea doesn't mean it wasn't patentable. In fact, a great way to show novelty on an invention is if the invention does something that the relevant community at the time taught away from doing what the invention does. Even if this is a worthless invention, the underlying invention can still be patentable.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Willton, 6 May 2008 @ 10:13pm

Re: Why wouldn't it be patentable?
In fact, a great way to show novelty on an invention is if the invention does something that the relevant community at the time taught away from doing what the invention does.

Wow, I just realized how poor that English is. That's Warren G. Harding bad. Mea culpa.

Anyway, you get the point.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Mike (profile), 7 May 2008 @ 1:37am

Re: Why wouldn't it be patentable?
Just because some people thought it was a bad idea doesn't mean it wasn't patentable.

Er... the point being it wasn't non-obvious. It was a perfectly obvious idea that no one implemented because they thought it was a bad idea.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 7 May 2008 @ 5:37am

Re: Re: Why wouldn't it be patentable?
Anyway, you get the point.

I'm... not sure I do. I've read it and read it and it's still fairly incomprehensible. Care to give it another go?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Willton, 8 May 2008 @ 5:25am

Re: Re: Why wouldn't it be patentable?
Er... the point being it wasn't non-obvious. It was a perfectly obvious idea that no one implemented because they thought it was a bad idea.

You got some evidence to prove that point? A conclusory statement like that won't get you very far. If you have some evidence as to how this was obvious to one skilled in the art in October 2000, I'd be interested to hear it.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
David Donahue, 9 Jun 2008 @ 11:27am

It's actually kinda related to a good idea.
While it is now too late for Sitefinder. If there are other "bad" ideas that haven't been patented yet, and by that I mean feasible, but not in everyone's best interest to have implemented, then we could create a lockbox patent hording organization that does patent these "bad" ideas and then, by charter, never, ever implements them. They could then sue anyone who tried.

Wow, a way for software patents to NOT be evil.
[ link to this | view in thread ]