Not even Xiaomi is safe from this American patent troll

On Friday, the Chinese tech media reported something that, to longtime observers of the US legal system, is probably unsurprising: Xiaomi is being sued. The culprit, according to the Beijing Times, is a “notorious patent troll” called Blue Spike LLC. Patent trolls, if you’re not familiar with them, are companies and individuals that develop or acquire patents and then use them to sue other companies instead of using them to develop products. This has become a particular problem in the American tech industry because the US Patent Office has, over the past decade or two, accepted some very vague patents. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a nonprofit dedicated to protecting civil liberties in the digital world, writes that “the US Patent Office, overwhelmed and underfunded, issues questionable patents every day.” Patent trolls are the companies that apply for or buy up these vague patents and then use them to sue tech companies offering products that use similar technology.