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German police raiding CeBIT, wiping out infringing kiosks


Talk about a royal buzzkill. It seems like several demonstrators at CeBIT are having their parties cut way short by German officials, as local customs and police offers have "confiscated products from the stand of at least one exhibitor on suspicion the devices infringed on MPEG audio patents." Currently, the authorities wouldn't divulge exactly which companies are getting nailed for patent infringement, but they did insinuate that most of the products in question made issue with "a portfolio of patents" that primarily focused on "MP3 players, MPEG2-compliant set-top-boxes, DVB satellite receivers, PDAs, and computer sound boards." It was stated that Mele Digital Technology was "targeted" and could be facing the stiff arm of the law, and while we certainly feel for those affected by bogus patent filings, this certainly isn't the first time a company has been embarrassingly interrupted while plugging its product line at a major trade show. Note to vendors: it's probably not in your best interest to bring along products that contravene with an outstanding patent, capiche?