Don’t Touch That Technology
by Susan P. Altman (Pittsburgh) and Todd A. Fisher (Dallas).
If your client or customer asks you to input data into its database, do you readily agree, or do you first ask if you have the right to do the inputting?
Most service providers are more than happy to show their responsiveness and helpfulness and sometimes forget to check whether they have the right to use the technology licensed by their client.
The Fifth Circuit in Compliance Source Inc. v. GreenPoint MortgageFunding Inc. reminded us recently that use of someone else’s technology, even if it is only on behalf of and for the benefit of a licensee, may require explicit permission of the owner (not just the licensee) and failure to obtain that explicit permission may result in a lawsuit.