After more than a year without new cases filed, Auth Token LLC has fired off another round of complaints, this time suing ADP (6:24-cv-00251) and seven banks: Austin Bank (2:24-cv-00354), Broadway Bancshares (6:24-cv-00253), Cadence Bank (2:24-cv-00355), Comerica (Comerica Bank) (2:24-cv-00356), Guaranty Bank & Trust (2:24-cv-00357), Home Bank (4:24-cv-01790), and Texas Capital Bancshares (2:24-cv-00358). In this campaign, the plaintiff targets the provision of financial products (e.g., payment cards) that support the EMV Card Personalization specification, with former Prism Technologies Group, Inc. patents generally related to “personalizing an authentication token”.

As recently reported by RPX in its Q4 in Review, NPE litigation targeting the Financial Services sector rose in 2021, with double the number of defendants added to litigation compared to 2020. The plaintiffs active in this sector today include several inventor-controlled NPEs, a publicly traded patent assertion entity, two Texas-based monetization firms, and multiple prolific litigants.

Auth Token LLC has unloaded another round of complaints, this time suing Bank of New York Mellon, Mastercard, M&T Bank, PNC Financial Services (PNC Bank), Regions Bank, Toronto-Dominion Bank (TD Bank), Truist Financial, US Bancorp (US Bank), Visa, Washington Federal Bank, and Wells Fargo over the provision of financial products, including payment cards that support the EMV Card Personalization specification and/or point-of-sale (POS) systems and related merchant systems. Up to two former Prism Technologies Group, Inc. patents are asserted against each defendant, the patents generally related to “personalizing an authentication token”.

Auth Token LLC has expanded its sole litigation campaign with suits against American Express (6:21-cv-01121), Bank of America (6:21-cv-01122), BMO Harris Bank (6:21-cv-01124), Citigroup, (6:21-cv-01125) and HBSC (6:21-cv-01126) in the Western District of Texas; Capital One (2:21-cv-00408) and JP Morgan Chase & Co. (2:21-cv-00409) in the Eastern District of Texas; and Fifth Third Bank (4:21-cv-02100) in the Northern District of Ohio. The asserted patent generally relates to “personalizing an authentication token”, with the defendants accused of infringement through the provision of financial products (e.g., payment cards) that support the EMV Card Personalization specification.

Auth Token LLC has added four defendants to its sole litigation campaign, begun this past April over two patents generally related to “personalizing an authentication token”. Targeted is the support for the EMV specification in the respective financial products and services of China UnionPay (1:21-cv-01216), Cryptomathic (1:21-cv-01217), Discover (1:21-cv-01218), and HST Systems (1:21-cv-01219).

Currently available USPTO records suggest that Prism Technologies Group, Inc., a publicly traded NPE, still holds more than five dozen US patent assets; however, a new suit filed by Auth Token LLC calls at least some of those holdings into question. Auth Token filed separate lawsuits against Advent International (IDEMIA) (6:21-cv-00351), Feitian Technologies (6:21-cv-00350), JCB (6:21-cv-00352), UBIVELOX (6:21-cv-00353), and Yubico (6:21-cv-00354), pleading that it is the “assignee of all right, title and interest” in two patents-in-suit that assignment records still list as held by Prism. The accused products are EMV “smart cards”.