The DeFi Education Fund (DEF) has submitted a petition to the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) seeking to cancel the patent rights held by patent troll True Return Systems LLC (TRS), which attempted to sell the patent as an NFT. TRS subsequently sued "MakerDAO" and "Compound Protocol" for alleged infringement.TRS's patent was applied for and issued in 2018, claiming to have invented a method for bringing off-chain data onto the chain, including the use of oracles.
DEF's petition points out that relevant technology already existed in public documents before the patent was issued, including a NASDAQ patent that associates off-chain price data with on-chain transaction history.
DEF's goal is to defend the right to use open-source software and prevent TRS from suing other crypto projects. USPTO will decide whether to accept DEF's petition in the coming months.
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