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The SCO Group's lawsuits against large corporate users of Linux have focused attention on Linux and open-source software. What we find is that it is relatively easy for patent and copyright holders to find infringements of their intellectual property in open-source software because of free and unfettered access to the source code.
This is a twisted truth bordering on an outright lie. The fact is that it is relatively easy for patent and copyright holders to go looking for infringements. However, very few (if any) have actually been found.
Let's ignore the rather nebulous concept of patent infringement for the moment because with the current trend in broad and vague algorithm patents, infringement can occur in subtle ways that might requite 12 months of legal argument before anyone can figure out what is going on (in other words, even with full source code and a full text of the patent documents it is still just about impossible to decide).
Copyright infringement is much easier to figure out and more cut and dried to prove. In fact, there are a number of tools out there to provide automated search for copyright infringement (such as ESR's line signature system). Thus, any copyright holder who is concerned about being infringed by an Open Source project can methodically and relatively easily search for infringements. One would presume that those copyright holders who care, are already searching and have been for some time.
The fact that they haven't found anything speaks volumes.
Let's get back to the SCO case, after two years of media circus they still haven't found a solid tangible item that they can wave in the air and say, "here is infringement". They announced to the media that there were "a million lines" of source code lifted directly into Linux but when the judge asked for some of those lines, SCO just kept asking for more discovery and still to this day they can't deliver.
Relatvely easy to find infringements?
But yet infringements are not being found... funny that.
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