United States Patent and Trademark Office Concedes In Response to Association's Suit
Organization Declares Victory As A Result of Agency Rescission

WASHINGTON, DC January 14 - The National Intellectual Property Researchers Association (NIPRA) filed suit August 23rd, 2002 in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, seeking to bring the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) into compliance with section 4804(d)(2) of the American Inventors Protection Act. This action sought to block the USPTO plan to eliminate the public patent and trademark paper collections, critical collections relied upon for accurate intellectual property research.

As a result of NIPRA's complaint, the USPTO has rescinded its July 24, 2002 certification to Congress that the elimination of those collections would not negatively impact the public and agreed to resume the updating and maintenance of those vital records. In a December 9, 2002 letter to Congress, the Undersecretary Rogan stated that as the "litigation progressed, some supplemental issues arose that were not addressed at the time of the initial certification".

NIPRA asserts that these actions serve as a de facto admission by the USPTO that its electronic data systems are not "mature and reliable" as stated in its Federal Register notices of August 27, 2001 and April 9, 2002. Despite overwhelmingly negative responses to those notices, the USPTO continued its efforts to eliminate the paper collections and force reliance on the electronic search systems. In an effort to ascertain the validity of the electronic search systems NIPRA conducted several audits of the integrity of the data, audits which revealed an error rate as high as 52%. NIPRA, through a FOIA request, also obtained copies of internal studies conducted for the USPTO by PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PWC) in April and August of 2001 that indicated an error rate of approximately 36% in those same databases. In response to the NIPRA surveys and NIPRA's release of the PWC studies, the USPTO conducted an internal review of its database which indicated an error rate of 71%. This study was cited in a May 10, 2002 letter to the USPTO contractor tasked with data entry. The letter stated in part that the contractor was not in compliance with terms of its contract and that the impact of the NIPRA study "to the USPTO in terms of eliminating paper records is significant and detrimental". The letter further noted that weekly reports had been issued detailing the accuracy of the data entry and made specific reference to the PWC reports. It should be noted that all of these surveys and actions were completed months prior to Director Rogan's certification to Congress.

Although NIPRA is encouraged by the recent corrective actions taken by the USPTO in response to the litigation, it has adopted a "wait and see" position with regard to the agencies completion of the terms of anticipated consent agreements and court orders. Further, NIPRA maintains that given the wealth of evidence available at the time of the Director's certification, the USPTO's assertions and resulting initiatives were indefensible. Notwithstanding the recent remedial actions of the agency, NIPRA asserts that the USPTO initiatives that forced it to enter into costly litigation demonstrate an arrogance and disregard for the public interest that have no place in an agency charged with providing a vital public service.

NIPRA is a not-for-profit association of Intellectual Property attorneys, agents and professional researchers organized to promote and protect the quality and integrity of the USPTO patent and trademark records and search systems.

Press Release of August 26, 2002