Apple accused of patent infringement and demanding a half-billion dollar fine

"Patent troll" Mirror World LLC is demanding a $625.5 million fine from Apple. The companies have been in court since 2008, and Apple lost the final hearing, which concluded a few days ago.

Apple has been found guilty of infringing three patents. Apple is being asked to pay a $208.5 million fine for each. Apple's lawyers are challenging the $417 million in claims for two of the three patents.

Mirror Worlds accused Apple of infringing patents on technologies used in Mac OS X and iPhone mobile devices, specifically the use of document streaming. Apple products use a specific method for navigating document lists: document contents are displayed in a preview mode, and the documents themselves are presented in chronological order.

These patents were obtained by the founder of Mirror Worlds back in 1999. Mirror Worlds sold the disputed patents at least twice: for $210,000 and later for $5 million. The amount of compensation sought by Mirror Worlds exceeds the market value of the patents by 125 times.

The case against Apple was heard in a Texas court, the same court that several months ago banned the sale of the Word text editor after claims by the company i4i.