Patents, trolls and anonymity
February 25th, 2008, Tomasz RychlickiThe successful strategy of Chicago plaintiffs firm Niro, Scavone, Haller & Niro of representing patent-holding companies with strong infringement claims on a contingency basis has spawned many imitators.
The term “patent troll” was famously coined in reference to firm co-founder Ray Niro. But in the past few months the firm has been involved in such controversial situations that a question arises: Is this how a patent plaintiffs firm acts in middle age?
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By that time Niro was involved in a growing spat with an anonymous blogger called the “Troll Tracker”. Niro doesn’t like to be called a “troll,” but Troll Tracker started referring to Niro that way. So Niro pulled out an old weapon. He e-mailed the blogger, informing him that he may be infringing on patent number 5,253,341.
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For the moment, Niro and the Troll Tracker are at a standoff because the blogger refuses to reveal his identity. But Niro is willing to use his unorthodox tactics to surmount that obstacle. “I’ll offer $5,000 to anyone that can provide information that leads me to the identity of Troll Tracker,” Niro says, announcing the bounty publicly for the first time here in IP Law & Business. “I view these people [anonymous bloggers] as know-nothings,” he says, “afraid to reveal their identity.”
Those are parts from the article available at www.law.com website. And now is clear. Troll Tracker is a blog owned by Rick Frenkel, currently working for Cisco.