Crypto advocacy group the Cryptocurrency Open Patent Alliance (COPA) and the patent-focused organization Unified Patents have launched a campaign against “patent trolls” targeting blockchain and crypto tech.

COPA said in an Oct. 1 blog post that the pair launched the “Blockchain Zone,” a campaign to target patents under the control of non-practicing entities (NPEs), which covers a slew of technology from non-fungible tokens (NFT), wallets and smart contracts .

COPA said the partnership will aim to protect blockchain firms and developers from “unwarranted and costly”  legal claims  by patent trolls, or NPEs, who use the high costs of a court battle to negotiate a settlement.

Patent trolls, or hoarders, are entities that hold patents with the aim of profiting from them by licensing them or suing those who use them without permission. They typically don’t use the patent themselves.

According to Unified Patents, these entities accounted for 58% of all patent litigation in the United States last year and targeted tech companies 95% of the time.

Patent trolls (red) filed over 1,700 lawsuits over their held patents in 2023. Source: Unified Patents

“Patent trolls are barriers in the path of innovation,” said Coinbase’s legal chief, Paul Grewal. “They must be stopped so that the community can continue to do the important business of building the crypto-economy.”

Unified Patents CEO Kevin Jakel said the partnership ensures the crypto sector “won’t be hindered by the all-too-common baseless patent assertions affecting other sectors of the economy.”

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The crypto space has had its share of alleged patent trolls. In September, advocacy body the DeFi Education Fund (DEF) moved to cancel a patent “linking offchain data to a blockchain” owned by True Return Systems, who had filed actions against crypto protocols MakerDAO (now Sky) and Compound Finance for infringement.

DEF bought the patent from True Return in August as part of a settlement agreement, which ended its claims against Sky and Compound.

Meanwhile, the crypto domain name service Ethereum Name Service (ENS) is challenging a patent granted to its rival Unstoppable Domains — which says it made tech that uses blockchain to determine domains — claiming it pioneered the tech.

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