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Protegrity Announces An Update In Patent Infringement Lawsuit Against Voltage Security

United States Patent and Trademark Office confirms validity of one of Protegrity’s database encryption patents

Aug 09, 2011 | 03:25 PM | 


STAMFORD, CONN., August 9, 2011 – Protegrity Corporation announced an update in the pending patent infringement lawsuits it previously filed against Voltage Security, Inc., Ingrian Networks (now Safenet) and nuBridges, Inc. (see press release: http://bit.ly/ouWUj9).

In three separate lawsuits, Protegrity sued Voltage, Ingrian/Safenet and nuBridges for infringing Protegrity’s U.S. Patent 6,321,201 (’201 Patent). As an attempt to invalidate the ‘201 Patent, Voltage Security requested the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) reexamine the ‘201 Patent on December 1, 2010. Voltage based its Reexamination Request on specific prior art references that Voltage claimed should have prevented issuance of the ‘201 Patent in the first place.

In the Reexamination, Protegrity voluntarily submitted to the USPTO all of the other 180 prior art references identified by Voltage, Ingrian/Safenet or nuBridges in the patent litigation as purportedly invalidating the ‘201 Patent. Protegrity argued to the USPTO that all the claims of the ‘201 Patent asserted by Protegrity in the litigation against Voltage, Ingrian/Safenet and nuBridges, as well as 36 newly submitted claims, were patentable over all of the prior art references.

On July 5, 2011, the USPTO, after carefully reviewing all of the prior art references, confirmed the patentability of the asserted patent claims as well as the 36 new claims, and on August 5, 2011 announced its intent to issue a reexamination certificate of the ‘201 Patent accordingly. These claims cover methods of protection of data in a database by use of data-sensitivity-level based protection rules stored in a data protection catalogue.

At the request of Voltage, Ingrian/Safenet and nuBridges, the Court had put the patent infringement lawsuits against them on hold to await the outcome of the Reexamination. However, now that the USPTO has determined the asserted claims of the ‘201 Patent are valid over all the prior art references, the patent infringement lawsuits against Voltage, Ingrian/Safenet and nuBridges will immediately resume.

“Protegrity’s intellectual property is the lifeblood of our organization and capacity to deliver the most innovative and effective data security solutions for staying compliant,” said Suni Munshani, CEO for Protegrity USA, Inc. “The favorable outcome of the reexamination underscores the market value of our investment in research, development and engineering, and leaves no question that our pioneering database encryption patent is even stronger than before.”

U.S. Patent 6,321,201 describes a data security system for a database having multiple protection levels applicable on a data element value level. This enables applying data sensitivity driven encryption levels for specific categories of data in a database based on data element types that are commonly arranged in columns. The patent is central to Protegrity’s Data Security Platform, a comprehensive solution for securing sensitive data across the entire enterprise while significantly lowering the total cost and time required to stay compliant.

About Protegrity

Headquartered in Stamford, Conn., Protegrity provides high performance, infinitely scalable, end-to-end data security solutions that protect sensitive information across the enterprise from the point of acquisition to deletion. The company’s award winning patented software products span a variety of data protection methods, including end-to-end encryption, tokenization, masking and monitoring and are backed by several important data protection technology patents. Currently, more than 200 enterprise customers in retail, financial services, oil & gas, insurance, travel and transportation rely on Protegrity’s comprehensive data security solutions to enable compliance for PCI-DSS, HIPAA, HITECH Act and other data security requirements while protecting their sensitive data, brand, and business reputation. For more information, please log on to http://www.protegrity.com.



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