Facebook Files Patent Counterclaim Against Yahoo

New York City, NY – Facebook is not taking Yahoo’s patent lawsuit against it lying down. The social networking giant has filed a counterclaim against Yahoo for patent infringement.

Facebook’s lawsuit Tuesday came just weeks after Yahoo Inc. claimed that Facebook violated 10 patents covering advertising, privacy controls and social networking. Facebook denied Yahoo’s allegations and accused Yahoo of violating 10 of its patents covering photo tagging, advertising, online recommendations and more.

Facebook is about to go public in an IPO that is expected to bring in about $10 billion dollars from the market. This sum would place the valuation of Facebook at $100 billion dollars. Yahoo has been struggling for years but still sees its company’s market cap at over $18 billion dollars.

Facebook recently acquired 750 patents from IBM Corp. covering technologies that deal with software and networking. At the end of 2011, Facebook had just 56 U.S. patents, which was a relatively small number compared with other big tech companies. Yahoo owns more than 1,000 patents.

Facebook is claiming irreparable harm in it lawsuit against Yahoo. Ted Ullyot, Facebook’s general counsel, said in a statement,

“While we are asserting patent claims of our own, we do so in response to Yahoo’s short-sighted decision to attack one of its partners and prioritize litigation over innovation,”

Yahoo responded with a statement of their own saying,

“As we have made clear from the outset, the unauthorized use of our patented technology is unacceptable and must be resolved appropriately. Other leading companies license these technologies, and Facebook must do the same or change the way it operates.”

Yahoo took a hit today in the market with its stock down on news of the lawsuit escalation.