A recently introduced patent bill would authorize patents on abstract ideas just for including computer jargon, and would even legalize the patenting of human genes. The “Patent Eligibility Restoration Act,” sponsored by Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), explicitly overrides some of the most important Supreme Court decisions of the past 15 years, and would tear down some of the public’s only protections from the worst patent abuses.
Pro-patent maximalists are trying to label the Tillis bill as a “consensus,” but it’s nothing of the sort. We need EFF supporters to send a message to Congress that it isn’t acceptable to allow patent trolls, or large patent-holders, to hold our technology hostage.
TELL THE SENATE TO REJECT THE TILLIS PATENT BILL
We Don’t Need ‘Do it on a Computer’ Patents
Starting in the late 1990s, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit essentially did away with any serious limits on what could be patented. This court, the top patent appeals court in the U.S., allowed patents on anything that produced a “useful result,” even when that result was just a number. This allowed for a period of more than a decade during which the U.S. Patent Office issued, and the courts enforced, all kinds of ridiculous patents.
Several Supreme Court decisions eventually limited the power of bad patents. Most importantly, the Supreme Court’s 2014 Alice Corp. v.
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