EFF and the the Public Interest Patent Law Institute are seeking to unseal a host of court records documenting a patent dispute between Google and Uniloc, a prolific patent litigant.

Secrecy pervades the entire record in Uniloc v. Google. When Google filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, the parties filed much of their briefs and most of their documentary exhibits under seal, keeping even basic facts about those documents (like their length) secret. Worse, the parties did not file any sealing motions or make any other attempt to justify their excessive secrecy. This conduct violated the public’s access rights under the Constitution and common law as well as the standing order of the presiding judge, Judge Rodney Gilstrap. But nothing happened.

EFF and PIPLI filed a motion to intervene and unseal documents in Uniloc v. Google, a patent case in the Eastern District of Texas, to ensure that the public knows what happens when companies litigate in publicly funded courts. The motion was filed with assistance from Columbia Law School’s Science, Health, and Information Clinic, dedicated to expanding public access to information about technology.