HTC sends ROM website cease and desist letter

By on Jun 17, 2010 at 6:49 PM
Legal June 17, 2010

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HTC has sent a cease and desist letter to ROM website shipped-roms.com. The letter states that HTC’s intellectual property is being violated due to the “illegal copying of  [...] original art work.” Shipped ROMS, which is only about two months old, has managed to accumulate a vast library of HTC and BlackBerry ROMs; some of which belong to unreleased handsets. The site has said they will “do what they can” to keep the lights on. We’ve got the full text of the letter after the bounce.

[Via Mobile Crunch]

From: XXXXXXXXX
Sent: Thursday, June 17, 2010 2:50 PM
To: ‘request@shipped-roms.com’
Cc: XXXXXXXXXX
Subject: Cease and Desist Letter of HTC ROMs posted on your website
Importance: High

Dear Sir or Madam:

I write to you on behalf of HTC Corporation (“HTC”), a Taiwanese company with a global business, who is the owner of certain intellectual property (“HTC’s Intellectual Property”). It is our understanding that you are responsible for the hosting of an internet webpage located at http://shipped-roms.com (the “Site¡¨). HTC has also recently learned that the Site contains software/ROM related to HTC’s Intellectual Property which entails illegal copying of HTC’s original art work.

We have very strong reasons to believe that the HTC Intellectual Property was illegally obtained by fraudulent means. The subject dissemination and publication of HTC’s Intellectual Property is in clear violation of HTC’s legal rights and is an infringement of the HTC’s copyrights, goodwill, as well as the other intellectual rights. The continuing distribution of HTC’s Intellectual Property without authorization has constituted a serious criminal offence under the Copyright Act in the U.S. and the EU and other countries where similar laws are enforced.

As you would expect, HTC is the owner and the use of the copyrighted work described above has not been authorized by the owner. By publishing and displaying the Intellectual Property on the Site, you, as the publisher, along with the information source are infringing HTC’s Intellectual Property rights, including but not limited to causing HTC irreparable harm.

For the above reasons, HTC requests that you immediately remove the Intellectual Property from the Site or of all infringing works derived from the Intellectual Property. You shall desist from this or any other infringement of HTC’s rights in the future.

The above information is true and correct. If we have not received an affirmative response from you within two weeks indicating that you have fully complied with these requirements, we shall take further legal action, and pursue all means necessary to protect HTC’s legal and equitable rights. HTC reserves all its rights against you, including legal and equitable remedies.

Best regards,
Legal Counsel

HTC Corporation
No.23, Xinghua Rd.,
Taoyaun City, Taoyuan County 330, Taiwan
Tel: +886-3-375-3252 Ext.6157

CONFIDENTIALITY NOTE : The information in this e-mail is confidential and privileged; it is intended for use solely by the individual or entity named as the recipient hereof. Disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the contents of this e-mail by persons other than the intended recipient is strictly prohibited and may violate applicable laws. If you have received this e-mail in error, please delete the original message and notify us by return email or collect call immediately. Thank you. HTC Corporation

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  • skyy_flyer

    “CONFIDENTIALITY NOTE : The information in this e-mail is confidential and privileged; it is intended for use solely by the individual or entity named as the recipient hereof. Disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the contents of this e-mail by persons other than the intended recipient is strictly prohibited and may violate applicable laws. If you have received this e-mail in error, please delete the original message and notify us by return email or collect call immediately. Thank you. HTC Corporation”

    Well, if your suiing us for ROM’s, hell whats another lawsuit?

    • ZoidZoid

      LOL, I thought the exact same thing.

    • Michael

      Disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the contents of this e-mail by persons other than the intended recipient

      .. but if you are the intended recipient I don’t see any prohibition against you distributing it.

      • Henry H

        Too bad BGR wasn’t the intended recipient.

      • Hendrix

        If BGR had initially received this e-mail in error and posted it, they would be in the wrong. If the correct recipient got it, they are free to do with it as they please and that includes giving it to BGR to post.

    • Supersonic FTMFW

      There’s no problem circulating this. It’s not confidential; they sent it to a third party. These types of disclaimers are standard on all emails sent from a lawyer, even those that are not confidential. The email program that the attorney sets up tacks it on at the end automatically.

  • CJ

    Serves ‘em right for doing something that they surely know is legally suspect.

    • badonkadonk

      Quick browse through the BlackBerry side of things reveals only install packages for phones that are in-market. They may be leaks of beta drops, but it doesn’t look like they are… more likely these are updates for phones sent out by various carriers, this just aggregates them on a single site. I don’t see how this action could be considered illegal, but IANAL

  • Me

    Cooked ROMs seem like a good thing. HTC makes its money off of hardware, and quality cooked ROMs encourage people to buy HTC hardware in order to use them. I wonder if they are planning to move more into the software side of the mobile world, and thus are now more strongly defending their intellectual property.

    Or maybe they are venting anger from being sued by Apple.

  • http://(null) judontknow

    boot pc’s and servers

    Format C: /q …

    Posted from BGR Mobile (iPhone).

  • wet tshirts rule

    So much for open source….not that more than 1% even utilize that part of android

  • Ankit

    Before you all get your panties in a jiffy, this letter was a response to the hundreds of leaked ROMs for unreleased devices and/or information about them available on the website. These things can be a poor representative of HTC quality, hence the cease and desist.

    HTC so far has no problems with custom ROMs or even porting Sense to non-HTC devices, at least to my knowledge. If they did, xda-developers, DroidForums, AllDroid, etc. Would have had to change their ways a very long time ago.

  • MikeD

    HTC becoming the man? Say it ain’t so.

  • SOUTHERN MISS ELITE

    Leaked roms make a company look bad. It’s just like how Sony and Microsoft sometimes sends out letters to unofficial 3rd party manufactures.

    HTC probably doesn’t honestly care that someone is making custom roms…unless it’s making them look bad OR of course unless they’re profiting off the leaked roms.

    Simple solution: Contact HTC, get their blessings to make your own custom roms, and keep it moving. That…or be ready to fight them in court.

  • http://cyberbulletin.wordpress.com/ Jouten

    I really loved my HTC Hero (GSM-Asia), but I could never ‘root’ it due to some unusual circumstances.

    However, since I believe that HTC is turning Android into a proprietary format (Sense), there’s really no reason for me now to go and try out the iPhone 4 until Android matures a bit more…

    • http://cyberbulletin.wordpress.com/ Jouten

      to ‘not’ try…

  • nick

    So the bottom of the email with the address has a spelling error. You think it was translated or typed wrong. Highlight the address and google map it then it suggests something close. Here is what I found…(I wanted to see what HTC looked like)
    *Google Maps spelling
    HTC Corporation
    No.23, Xinghua Rd.,
    near Taoyuan City, Taoyuan County, Taiwan 330

    *Email Spelling (you would think they would have noticed that)
    HTC Corporation
    No.23, Xinghua Rd.,
    **Taoyaun** City, Taoyuan County 330, Taiwan

    im bored lol but owell thought it was interesting if someone else thought the same thing to.

  • frank

    who cares they’re in taiwan hahaha

    • Henry H

      Irrelevant. That doesn’t protect shipped roms.

  • Michael Perry

    Cooked ROMS?!?! Pffftt…. Try having your prototype phone stolen, sold to the highest bidder, then paraded around the internet like it’s not a violation of law. Then try having the whole internet flame you when you try to get your stolen property back. :-(

  • http://ahyen.com Jianchung

    Somehow I find this sooooo funny. Why dont they just fire all their staff while they are at it?

    Can they really put a stop to ROMs?

    If they really wanted to they could make their device stop functioning after flashing. But then again that could piss off tons of folks haha

  • Shane

    I believe there is some question as to the authenticity of the original cease and desist letter. It was apparently not sent by their U.S. counsel which doesn’t really make sense. It also doesn’t appear to have been drafted by an attorney at all based on the language in the letter itself.

  • Sheep Dog

    I am calling this posting of this email as bogus. I have never read a letter from any legal counsel that did not sign their name. All attorneys have egos that are larger than life. None of them would send a letter without their name.

    • Supersonic FTMFW

      Taiwan egos < American egos

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