Bonum Certa Men Certa

COVID-19 Crisis: When EPO Outsources Everything to a Surveillance System of Microsoft and the NSA

A joke or a farce of a 'justice' system, where the platform is controlled by a company that commits a lot of serious crimes and works for the Pentagon, builds internment camps for ICE etc.

Grant Philpott E-mail regarding Microsoft



Summary: In another major fiasco, EPO management gives Microsoft control over (or insight into) the competitors' business and highly confidential legal affairs (along with the US government, by extension); it's likely not legal, it is definitely not constitutional, and EPO staff complains about the laughing stock that the EPO rapidly becomes under António Campinos, who totally exploits the pandemic to shamelessly attack staff and grossly violate the EPC

MR. Campinos rapidly turns out to be even worse than Battistelli. COVID-19 brings out the worst of him and he's bringing out the EPO to Microsoft, a foreign monopolist whose Skype surveilance is a subject we've been covering for over a decade (even before Microsoft bought it).



As longtime readers may recall, half a decade ago we wrote many articles about favourable Microsoft treatment at the EPO and even leaked material to that effect. In our newly-tidied-up wiki pages it can be found. They're linked from here still. Nothing has improved since; in fact, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) nowadays wants to punish applicants who do not use Microsoft's proprietary OOXML -- that's how bad it is (but at least both that office and the company are American!).

So a company that lobbies against 35 U.S.C. €§ 101, lobbies for software patents in Europe, blackmails competitors using patents and so on is taking control of some of the EPO's 'crown jewels'.

Is this legal?

Of course not. Common sense!

"Is this legal? Of course not. Common sense!"Is EPO management doing it regardless? You bet! It's not like they ever allowed 'pesky' laws and 'obnoxious' constitutions stand in the way of fake 'production'.

Thankfully, staff representatives already speak about it. The anonymous "Kluwer Patent blogger" wrote about it yesterday.

So while taking another building in Haar (while leaving empty space in existing buildings) the EPO is happy to send venues of EPO... to Microsoft. Only 2 years ago they finished wasting lots of money on a new building and they plan several more at a huge cost (while falsely claiming to lack money for staff!) and now this:



The Central Staff Committee (CSC) of the EPO is very outspoken above the announcement, in the middle of the coronapandemia, that videoconferencing will be the new standard: we’re being rushed into a change which is full of legal and technical pitfalls. In a letter published on the EPO’s internal pages half April, the CSC points out that many high and lower courts in the member states have suspended all oral proceedings which are not absolutely urgent. It “would make sense to align the Office with the practice as well as with emergency provisions of its host countries. This would also appear mandated by the Protocol on Privileges and Immunities.”

The CSC argues: “Holding oral proceedings as distributed videoconferences with the members of the division participating at different locations in the Office or at home is part of your initiative of generalising and making teleworking mandatory, which constitutes a fundamental change in the working conditions of an major part of staff. It must therefore be subject to statutory consultation with the COHSEC and the GCC in accordance with Articles 38(2) and 38a(3) ServRegs.

Since it has been decided to extend the new procedures for oral proceedings in examination beyond the current Corona crisis, in-depth consultation is necessary. The same applies to opposition oral proceedings for which this new procedure appears likewise here to stay.”

The CSC sees various legal issues: “Opposition oral proceedings are by law public proceedings, cf. Article 116(4) EPC. It is not at all clear how this is guaranteed if the hearing is conducted as a ViCo (see e.g. T1266/07, points 1.2 and 1.3). The preliminary guidance given in VP1’s announcement (…) states that if the division “receive[s] requests of public to attend opposition proceedings performed via ViCo” it should “contact [its] line manager”, presumably that of the first examiner. Aside from the fact that the line manager is not competent for interfering with the discretionary decisions of the Divisions, the public does not need to “request” attendance, or to announce it in advance. A possibility for the public to attend should therefore be guaranteed in all cases, regardless of any advance request. The guidance thus brings examiners into a conflict between the expectations of management and the requirements of the EPC.”

“A problem of breach of confidentiality might further arise if members of divisions were not able to adequately isolate themselves, especially during examination non-public OP’s and during deliberations.”

On the technical side there are issues as well, according to the CSC: “a yet unknown number of examiners cannot establish simultaneously both a Skypefor-Business connection and an EPO network connection via Pulse-VPN, as would be required for ViCo OPs, because the network hosts the application documents and the EPO email account. Only either connection works fine by itself.”

This leads the CSC to a very clear conclusion: let’s not do this. “At present there are no clear laws, no guidelines and no technical facilities to allow distributed oral proceedings in examination and opposition proceedings. In the latter case, even “non-distributed” ViCos with divisions on the Office premises would at present not rest on a solid legal basis.

The measures presently foreseen should be immediately halted and reviewed, also involving the Staff Representation.

In view of the additional strain on the examiner’s mental health, we can at present only advise divisions to judiciously choose, weighing all circumstances, whether to conduct oral proceedings by ViCo or rather to postpone them to a later date until circumstances for conducting them either as a classical ViCo from the Office premises or as “standard” proceedings in person are restored.”



This is amazing! See the bit highlighted about.

Are we shocked? Of course not, the EPO breaks the law all the time and as recently as yesterday it openly advertised in Twitter its bribery programme for scholars. Here's what MaxDrei said about the above (he still comments in IP Kat, where comments critical of EPO for abuses are being censored):

Those running the EPO business are clearly disciples of the “Never let a Good Crisis Go to Waste” school of management thinking. Get in with a measure to cut costs and raise profit levels, regardless of any loss of product quality. Those running the EPO business (management, supervisory Board), it seems to me, have no appreciation of any importance in preserving the reputation of the EPO for the quality of its decisions on matters of fact and law.

Any criticism of setting the VC as default will be waved away as the bleatings of self-interested patent attorney firms, thwarted in their efforts to hold on to high turnover and profit figures associated with in vivo oral proceedings. It’s up to the critics to find lines of argument that are resistant to being fobbed off as mere self-interest. After all, the patents courts of England are now making heavy use of VC technology to keep patent litigation ticking along. Justice delayed is, of course, justice denied. it’s just that these VC Hearings are not used for the cross-examination of vital witness testimony, for which the judge needs to see the witness and their interlocutor face-to-face.

Who can give us examples of unscrupulous use of the VC to frustrate the over-riding objective of doing justice?


"Concerned observer" replied:

It is a matter of fact that a Decision of the President of the EPO cannot have the effect of altering (the interpretation of) the EPC. The President simply does not have the power to amend (on his or her own) the Articles or Rules of the EPC in any way. Any restrictions imposed by the President on the right to be heard are therefore clearly unlawful and unenforceable (by the Boards of Appeal).

Especially in the current circumstances, it is perfectly reasonable for ViCo technology to be offered as an OPTION to parties to proceedings before the EPO. However, for the reasons outlined above, it is unacceptable for proceedings to be conducted by ViCo against the wishes of any party to the proceedings. For opposition proceedings, the use of ViCos also poses problems (as discussed by Max and Attentive) regarding attendance by members of the public.

So why would the President issue such an obviously problematic (and unlawful) Decision?

Frankly, there is no good answer to this question. Indeed, this situation merely serves to illustrate the arrogant and, at times, lawless behaviour of the EPO’s President (and senior management, who must surely also shoulder some of the responsibility for this latest outrage).

This situation also raises another question to which there is no good answer: who will stop the President from trying to ensure that the Decision is both upheld and enforced?

Certainly not the AC, as that has turned into a dog that is wagged by its tail. Perhaps the Boards of Appeal – but only if they still have sufficient independence to risk of opening up another political can of worms. (Bearing in mind that “resistance” from the Boards could lead to another situation where the President, perhaps again enabled by the AC, tries to overturn any inconvenient case law by introducing an Implementing Regulation that overrides the current interpretation of Article 113(1) … and perhaps ultimately to another referral to the Enlarged Board in which the President kindly asks the EBA to agree with his novel interpretation of the EPC.)

Previously, it was clear that the list of “stakeholders” whose voices and opinions that this (and/or the previous) President of the EPO was happy to ignore included (non-senior) EPO staff, EPO staff representatives, Board of Appeal members, the Association of the Members of the Boards of Appeal, national courts and their judges (as illustrated by events in the Corcoran case) and certain (national associations of) professional representatives. To that list we can now add the epi, patent applicants, opponents and interested members of the public.

This poses one more question: is there any stakeholder whose opinion the President will take seriously? The way that things are currently working out, and absent a move by large numbers of applicants to take their cases to national patent offices, I would wager that the answer to this question is “no”.


MaxDrei agreed:

...Concerned’s concluding thought nails it.

The arrogance on the top floor of the EPO can be imagined as a nonchalant shrug of the Presidential shoulders and a casual throwaway remark from him, to the effect that:

“If the Applicants don’t like it, they can eff off and take their cases to the national Patent Offices. But, until a lot of them do exactly that though, I shall keep going with my sociopathic, corporation-style policies. And for exactly the same reason as in all those anti-social corporations, namely, to maximise the “value” that the Chief Executive doles out to the EPO’s shareholders. It is the ONLY duty imposed on the legal person that is a corporation. If that duty is good enough for a corporation, it’s good enough for the EPO too. Especially the EPO. Because what’s good for the EPO shareholders is good for the general public in Europe. End of discussion.”


"Not a friend of obligatoy ViCos" then said: "Imagine that your law firm has a well-functioning SIP/H.323 video-conferencing systems, you receive the conference number and the required information how to dial in with the SIP/H.323 video-conferencing system, and one (!) day (!) before the oral proceedings via ViCo you are informed that despite the official information provided together with the conference number (https://www.epo.org/applying/online-services/proceedings/technical-guidelines.html) only Microsoft Skype for Business can be used, because the examiners sit at home and SIP/H.323 cannot be used in such circumstances…"

Emphasis is ours. So Microsoft is now like a European court? Of course it's not legal. It's even worse when they put a criminal company in charge of it -- a company that already admitted that it spies on people's personal E-mails for its business purposes (or putting people in prison for doing things Microsoft itself dislikes).

EPO in 2020: brought to you by Microsoft!

“Microsoft is, I think, fundamentally an evil company.”

--Former Netscape Chairman James H. Clark

Recent Techrights' Posts

For the First Time in a Month OSI's "OpenSource.org" Blogs and It's Basically a Microsoft Blog Post (Microsoft Controls OSI)
For the first time in a month OSI writes something and it is Microsoft propaganda composed by a Microsoft-salaried operative
Microsoft, Already Borrowing 3 Billion Dollars a Month, is Trying to Cause Many People to Resign
MSN (i.e. Microsoft) and others openly admit it
They Want Activists to Just Barely Walk and Eat, Not Do Activism Anymore
It's sort of like the ending of '1984'
Non-Free JavaScript Programs in Banks Aren't Even the Biggest Problem
Technology was supposed to make life easier; in practice, however, for most of us the opposite effect can be observed
IBM is Obliterating Fedora
"Fedora releases were shipping with an increasing number of bugs on launch day even while I was using it for a several year stretch."
 
Censorship Regarding Red Hat Layoffs
Talk about this? They'd rather not.
Struggling to Cut Costs, Microsoft Continues Shutting Down and Cancelling Stuff This Month
There are August layoffs at Microsoft
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, August 07, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, August 07, 2025
Fake 'Linux' Articles, Written by Bots to Take Traffic Away From Real Articles
LLM slop helps replace information with junk or misinformation
When Google's Googlebombing of "Gemini" Was Not Enough; They Now Also Googlebomb "Gemini Space"?
We know GAFAM not only worries about Gemini Protocol but also attempts to 'infiltrate' Geminispace
The Register MS Promotes Microsoft Slop, Assumes All Readers Use Microsoft Windows
Microsoft really dominates the site
Gemini Links 08/08/2025: KDE/Qt Development and What's Missing From "Retro"
Links for the day
Links 07/08/2025: US Punishes India Instead of Russia, Attacks Law Firms to Prevent Scrutiny
Links for the day
Read Us in Geminispace as Well
it's definitely a lot simpler than using a Web browser
Once a Site About BSD and GNU/Linux, and After Months of Silence, LinuxBSDos.com Comes Back Only as a Slopfarm
very frustrating
Links 07/08/2025: Hardware Wars, Mass Recall of Colgate Total Clean Mint, More Microsoft Holes Found
Links for the day
Gemini Links 07/08/2025: "Right To Manage" and LoRa Analysis
Links for the day
GAFAM 'Says' is Front Page "News"
The point of journalism is to check and assess facts, not parrot what people and companies merely claim
Links 07/08/2025: Apple Makes False Promises, More Trouble for Microsoft
Links for the day
OSS Didn't Always Mean Open Source Software
"oligarchs all the way down"
The Register MS Does More Microsoft Sez or GitHub Sez (Says) Pieces
60 minutes ago
Quit Perpetuating the Narrative of Gemini Protocol 'Dying' (It's False)
The "whisper campaign" against Gemini Protocol
Criticising Social Control Media in Social Control Media
Many people are quitting Social Control Media (fewer of them announce this in public)
Slopfarms Are Typically Fake News
Slopfarms typically relay falsehoods
Gemini Links 06/08/2025: Replacing a Pocket Watch and Buying in Bulk
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, August 06, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, August 06, 2025
August Hits Microsoft Hard: Dead Divisions, Dead Products, Layoffs Again (on Week 1)
Microsoft's debt is soaring
Slopwatch: Slow Day for LLM Slop, Serial Sloppers Still at It in Their Slopfarms
The Web would be better off if those sites went offline
Red Hat Layoffs Expected in 5 Days (Monday)
"They will announce and proceed with the cuts on 08/11."
Links 06/08/2025: Substack in Trouble, Slop Sceptic Shira Perlmutter Seeks Emergency Injunction Pending Appeal
Links for the day
Gemini Links 06/08/2025: Pinephone, Reverse-Engineering, and More
Links for the day
Links 06/08/2025: Faked Values of Slop Companies and Government Bailouts
Links for the day
FOSSY 2025 Conference Safety
The GAFAM-funded FOSSY 2025 is over
Microsoft's Favourite Pay-to-Say 'Analyst' Firm Has Just Collapsed
'Analysts' that helped propel Microsoft to fictional values akin to Ponzi schemes
Ask Google (Jeeves)
What does Google "know", not know, or would rather forget (or embellish)?
They Want You To Talk About Trump or 'The Other Bill' in Relation to Trafficking of Underage Girls for Sexual Exploitation
Just something we wanted to say...
How to Quadruple Your "Goodwill" Value and Grow Your (Wall) Street "Value" From $152B to $4000B Without Producing a Single Successful Product/Service
The longer it goes on for, the bigger the implosion will be
Staying Productive
Two very reputable institutions recently told us they now reckon Microsoft is somehow funding those SLAPPs against us
A Blow for Patent Ambitions of Bill Epsteingate
It's about money
66 Countries Where More People Use iPhones (or iPads) Than Microsoft Windows, According to statCounter Data
a list of countries where iOS now exceeds Windows
Apple's iOS Bigger Than Microsoft Windows in Many Countries
This ought to alarm Microsoft
The Mainstream Media Talks About Spotify Share Price and Price Hikes, Not Its Debt Increasing by About 33% in Just 12 Months
Spotify isn't a company in good shape
New "US Editor for The Register" is 80% Microsoft and Windows
they typically just treat Microsoft like the "Holy Grail" of "IT"
Microsoft is Apparently Sending Gag Orders or NDAs to Staff That Got Laid Off (“We were told not to post on LinkedIn. Not to say anything.”)
The main lies we keep seeing
Richard M. Stallman Has Published AI Memos Since 1980 (45 Years Ago)
Back when the term AI actually meant something
Gemini Links 06/08/2025: BitTorrent and Feedly Bots
Links for the day
Windows All-Time Lows, Android All-Time Highs in Kuwait
New lows for Windows can be found in many countries this month
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, August 05, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, August 05, 2025