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Altnet’s CEO Kevin Bremeister in June of 2003 articulated that several P2P developers were in potential violation of the patents that governed “hash” technology. In a press release issued today, Altnet has made good on its promise. "Altnet is very focused on the infringement of the TrueNames patent and we believe that many of today's active peer-to-peer applications may be in direct violation," Altnet CEO Kevin Bermeister said in a statement in 2003.In January of this year, StreamCast filed a lawsuit against Skype, Sharman, and several other StreamCast affiliates under the civil portion of the RICO Act. Included in this lawsuit is Kevin Bermeister, CEO of Altnet. It is believed that StreamCast’s motivation for this lawsuit stems from Morpheu’s 2002 removal from the FastTrack network.In this ongoing war of attrition between file-sharing developers, Altnet has decided to strike back. Showing that its 2003 words are more than a paper tiger, Altnet has sued StreamCast networks for violations of its “True Names” patents. In a press release issued today, Altnet’s Michael Speck, the enforcer of Altnet’s copyright issues, announced a new theater of operation. Specifically, Altnet filed a lawsuit in Central California District Court against StreamCast Networks, Inc., and its chief executive, Michael Weiss for apparent violations of Altnet’s “True Names” patent (numbers 5,978791 – 6,415,280 – 6,928,442.)
Also adding to the fracas this week is Altnet, which announced a legal settlement with the RIAA, Loudeye, and MediaSentry. The lawsuit, originally filed in 2004, was focused on an infringement claim related to the "TrueName" spoofing patent. The action targeted now-defunct Loudeye division OverPeer, and MediaSentry, now part of SafeNet.Spoofing is a technology designed to disrupt file-sharing networks, and block availability to specific pieces of content. The method involves a flood of bogus files, which are created to frustrate the would-be downloader. "We welcome this settlement as an important step toward the acknowledgement and recognition of the TrueName patents as a prerequisite to legitimate utilization and exploitation of P2P technology," said Kevin Bermeister, CEO of Altnet, a subsidiary of Brilliant Digital Entertainment. Patent holding company Kinetech was also a plaintiff. The RIAA and Loudeye declined comment on the settlement.