Bonum Certa Men Certa

Loose Data 'Protection' and Likely Privacy Infringements at the EPO: Here's Who Gets Employees' Internal Data

'Public' office, privately connected

Europatis form



Summary: Another look at Europatis, the company of a former EPO Vice-President (VP1), which is now accessing staff details at the EPO

This morning we wrote about the latest active venture of Jacques Michel, which we now know receives private information (internal data) from the EPO. Several people who used to work for the EPO still act as though they are inside the EPO, even though they run a private (for-profit) company. Talk about conflict of interests! They magically enough, owing to professional connections, get data about every member of staff at the EPO. This truly helps illustrative the hypocrisy of Team Battistelli.



Source for the numbers noted this morning: SOCIETE

"The main issue we have with Europatis right now is that it serves to show just how weak data protection is.""That sounds like it's just enough to provide a net income to feed one," wrote one person to us, "or maybe two, people, but it's hardly anything more of a mom-and-pop operation that occasionally rescues the freelancing retired examiner from terminal boredom. Not a big deal really, and this type of work is needed during both for the initial drafting of patent applications and for finding killer prior art for busting granted patents. They are not in competition with the EPO. Other groups such as professional patent researchers and registered IP counsels might have something to say, but that's another issue."

The main issue we have with Europatis right now is that it serves to show just how weak data protection is. The EPO already spies on staff with keyloggers and hidden cameras, so passing staff data in bulk ('wholesale' so to speak) probably shouldn't be so shocking.

"As to the data protection," wrote to us a reader, "people do keep in touch, and you generally know who is currently fetching his coat. In the present situation, that's certainly a heck of a lot of people -- and of coats.

"The EPO already spies on staff with keyloggers and hidden cameras, so passing staff data in bulk ('wholesale' so to speak) probably shouldn't be so shocking.""It's probably like those insistent headhunters who always ask you whether you might know anyone else might be interested in that "super" job in Milwaukee or suburban Ulaanbaatar they unsuccessfully tried to hook you with. And you happily oblige by warmly recommending a colleague you're not particularly fond of, hoping that both the headhunter and the colleague get the message."

As we noted this morning, neither Europatis nor the data passage is the big deal; there is an even bigger story involving Jacques Michel. We are going to cover this story in the coming week, in conjunction with the "Insensitivity at the EPO's Management" series. For those who want to know who's behind the company with access to internal EPO data, here is a document from 2009 converted into text, followed by another. Nothing too personal there, just registration details. It's only fair for EPO staff to know who's gaining access to some of their personal details (such as E-mail), potentially for personal gain.

0907399703

DATE DEPOT : 2009-08-31 NUMERO DE DEPOT : 73997 N€° GESTION : 2009B16103 N€° SIREN : 514485788 DENOMINATION : EUROPATIS ADRESSE : 61 rue des Morillons 75015 PARIS DATE D'ACTE : 2009/08/04 TYPE D’ACTE : DECISION DES ASSOCIES NATURE DACTE : NOMINATION DE GERANT(S)




EUROPATIS

Société à responsabilité limitée au capital de 4 000 euros

61 rue des Morillons

75015 PARIS

Les soussignés :

M onsieur Jacques MICHEL Né le 30 octobre 1937 à Reims (51) De nationalité française Dem eurant 61 rue des Morillons à Paris (75015) Marié sous le régime de la communauté

Madame Geneviève ALIGON épouse MICHEL Née le 23 novembre 1939 à Argenteuil (95) De nationalité française Demeurant 61 rue des Morillons à Paris (75015) Mariée sous le régime de la communauté

M. Laurent MICHEL Né le 24 décembre 1974 à Genève (Suisse) De nationalité française Demeurant 11 rue du Bois Fourgon à Villeconin (91580) Marié sous le régime de séparation de biens

se sont réunis à l'issue de la signature des statuts de la société EUROPATIS, pour désigner d'un commun accord le prem ier gérant de la société, conformément aux dispositions de l'article 10 des statuts de ladite société.

A cet effet, il est convenu de ce qui suit :

NOMINATION P U GÉRANT Les soussignés nomment en qualité de gérant de la société : - Monsieur Jacques MICHEL, demeurant 61 rue des Morillons à PARIS (75015) pour une durée illimitée.




Monsieur Jacques MICHEL n'entrera effectivement en fonction qu'à partir du jour où la société aura été immatriculée au Registre du Commerce et des Sociétés.

Monsieur Jacques MICHEL déclare accepter les fonctions de gérant qui viennent de lui être confiées. Il affirme n'exercer aucune autre fonction et n'être frappé d'aucune incapacité ou interdiction susceptible de l'empêcher d'exercer ce mandat.

RÉMUNÉRATION DU GÉRANT Le gérant ne percevra aucune rémunération. Il aura droit au remboursement de ses frais dûment justifiés engagés dans l'intérêt de la société.

Fait à Paris, le 4 août 2009 en trois originaux, deux pour les dépôts légaux et un pour les archives sociales.

M. Jacques MICHEL M. Laurent MICHEL Mme Geneviève ALIGON








0907399702

DATE DEPOT : 2009-08-31 NUMERO DE DEPOT: 73997 N€° GESTION : 2009B16103 N€° SIREN : 514485788 DENOMINATION : EUROPATIS ADRESSE : 61 rue des Morillons 75015 PARIS DATE D’ACTE : 2009/07/27 TYPE D’ACTE : ACTE NATURE D’ACTE : ATTESTATION BANCAIRELISTE DES SOUSCRIPTEURS




Banque Transatlantique

CREATION DE S.A.R.L. ATTESTATION DE BLOCAGE DU CAPITAL SOCIAL

La BANQUE TRANSATLANTIQUE sise 26 Avenue Franklin D. Roosevelt, 75008 PARIS déclare et atteste avoir reçu la somme de EUR. 4.000,00.

Monsieur Jacques MICHEL, gérante de la SARL €«EUROPATIS€» actuellement en cours de formation dont le siège social se situe 61 rue des Morillons 75015 PARIS, déclare, sous sa seule responsabilité, que cette somme représente la totalité du capital souscrit et libéré immédiatement.

Associés : M . Jacques MICHEL pour 2.000 parts soit 2.000 € de capital versé, Mme Geneviève MICHEL née ALIGON pour 100 parts soit 100 € de capital versé, M. Laurent MICHEL 1.900 parts pour 1.900 € de capital versé.

Nombre de parts : 4.000 Montant versé : 4.000,00 €

En conséquence, conformément aux dispositions législatives en vigueur, la somme ci-dessus demeurera bloquée en compte n€° 30568/19918/000/23365501/59 jusqu'à production du certificat d’immatriculation au Registre du Commerce et des Sociétés de la société actuellement en voie de formation. A défaut de ce certificat, elle pourra être débloquée, conformément à l'article L223-8 du Code de commerce :

- soit entre les mains du mandataire qui sera désigné par l'associé unique - soit sur décision de justice passée en force de chose jugée

La présente attestation est établie en double exemplaire pour faire valoir ce que de droit.

Fait à Paris, le 27 juillet 2009

Le déposant ("lu et approuvé") signature



Recent Techrights' Posts

SLAPP Censorship - Part 168 Out of 200: When Choosing Clients Recklessly and Poorly Self-Harm is Inevitable
"If you're doing something hard and nobody hates it, you probably aren't doing it. If the right people hate it and those people happen to be some of the worst people alive, so much the better."
 
Andrew Lee Has Turned Freenode Into a Slopfarm (Because Who Needs IRC Anyway?)
The site is churning out slop all day long
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, September 01, 2026
IRC logs for Tuesday, September 01, 2026
FSF Staff Uses 'CoC' to Stop Conversation About Autistici/Inventati in Relation to Free Software
The list is already heavily moderated
IBM Allegedly Stopped Hiring (This Tends to Coincide With Mass Layoffs)
Is a hiring freeze an echo of layoffs? Yes, definitely.
Something Big is Happening at IBM This Week/Month
Some people at IBM (and Red Hat) are panicking
Gemini Links 01/09/2026: Biscuits, Epstein Files, Power Users, and Alhena 5.6.8
Links for the day
Links 01/09/2026: Almost 5,000 Missing/Dead in Nepal-China Flood and Marijuana Factory Explodes
Links for the day
September at IBM: Silent Layoffs on Day 1
PIPocalypse at IBM
Last Month IRC Entered Its 39th Year and It's Still Growing (New IRC Networks)
There are 511+ known IRC networks
Links 01/09/2026: Climate, Disinformation, Microsoft Overworking People
Links for the day
Richard Stallman's Site Still Offline (Third Day), But Richard Stallman is Active Online
he is busy online despite his site not being accessible so far this week
PIP Layoffs at Microsoft, Even in India
Microsoft is trying to hide the true scale of the layoffs
Layoff Trackers Are a Sham, They're Like US 'Unemployment Data'
Layoff trackers are similarly misleading as they only measure what companies openly admit and register with WARN notices
The Peculiar Case of OSNews, Which Experiments With Slopfarming
It wasn't published in error. It has been there for two months.
Russian Federation is Removing Windows From Computers
Windows is going "out of fashion"
XBox CEO Has No Clue What She is Selling
Some people believe Microsoft will parcel and offload the whole "gaming" unit to some other companies
analognowhere.com and xkcd.com Selling Physical Copies of Webcomics
That's one way to support their work
PIP/GVSA at Microsoft: Mass Layoffs Disguised as Something Else
Microsoft is trying to cheapen the workforce because the numbers don't add up
Microsoft Lunduke Uses Twitter ("X") Because It's Algorithmically Designed to Boost His Worldview/s, He Ignores What "X" Is
Maybe all those people really deserve one another
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, August 31, 2026
IRC logs for Monday, August 31, 2026
Censorship by Threats
It should be noted that the Web site of Richard Stallman will soon enter its third day of downtime
In Romania, GNU/Linux Reaches 6%, According to Clownflare
Tomorrow we'll see the latest data from statCounter (for September)
Gemini Links 01/09/2026: Denali Park Train Trip, Crafts, and Community-Building in smol.pub
Links for the day
Microsoft Workers Doing 80 Hours a Week After Microsoft Culled Their Colleagues
there are days when they work 17 hours a day (barely any time left to sleep and eat) and work starts at 5AM
IBM Defrauds Shareholders With Fake News (Bribed Press) About "Quantum"
That says a lot about the state of "Tech Giants" and also the utterly shameless state of the media
Record Highs for GNU/Linux, Especially in the United States of America
the "market share" of GNU/Linux is about 9%, still about a third of what Vista 11 stands at
PIPocalypse at IBM
Silent layoffs
Spending Over a Million Bucks on Lawsuits Abroad When There's a Big Mortgage to Pay in America
Priorities, priorities...
Gemini Links 31/08/2026: Announcing ROOPHLOCH 2026, smol.pub Discussion, and LLM Plagiarism Engines Target Geminispace
Links for the day
Richard Stallman's GNU Turns 43 in 4 Weeks, FSF Growing
In a few weeks GNU turns 43
IBM's Cuts Are Worsening Security in GNU/Linux
IBM is still run by the same idiot who proposed taking over Red Hat
Microsoft: Work Weekends Too
Microsoft literally working its workers to death
Links 31/08/2026: Anthropic Sued Again for Copyright Infringement of Massive Scale, 'Tokenmaxxing' Shows Slop is a Worthless Liability
Links for the day
Links 31/08/2026: "Teslas Are Still Driving Into Oncoming Freight Trains" and "LLM Moats Quickly Evaporating"
Links for the day
Stallman Has Explained Slop is "Marketing Hype Campaign" and Torvalds Agreed. The Difference is the Bribes.
So be like Stallman
Debian Project Discards About 25% of the Votes on LLM Slop, Microsoft Votes in the General Resolution (GR)
"[t]he rules of the vote saw community members asked to rank each of the eight proposals. Just under 600 people voted, but Debian’s election team rejected many for unspecified reasons, leaving almost 450 valid votes to count."
Essentiality of Rest and Killing Oneself for Vicious Companies
Working for Microsoft is foolish
In the UK, Bing (Microsoft) Down to Lowest Level Since January
our tax money being passed to Microsoft via MoUs (back door deals with kickbacks)
SLAPP Censorship - Part 167 Out of 200: The Court of Appeal Might be the Next Step
Today is our last vacation day
German Government Sponsors IBM Because of GNU/Linux
Flatpak is sponsored by, run, and controlled by IBM
Richard Stallman Speaks to Christine Hall of FOSS Force, stallman.org is Down for Over a Day
interview does a good job addressing the hype about LLMs too
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, August 30, 2026
IRC logs for Sunday, August 30, 2026
Gemini Links 31/08/2026: Holidays, Stream of Consciousness, and Posting Online
Links for the day