The ssh vs. OpenSSH Trademark Battle, Next Round

If you are following the flap over the use of the letters Ess, Ess and Aitch in product names -- SSH Communications Security Corporation has asked the OpenSSH project to stop using those letters in the name of their software -- a story on NewsForge adds more details. If you didn't catch it then, here's yesterday's NewsForge article as well. Good thing nobody is enforcing a trademark on "telnet," eh?

My favorite tidbit from the article is this: "[OpenBSD and OpenSSH Developer Theo] de Raadt cites U.S. trademark law that requires owners of trademarks to notify violators immediately ... de Raadt argues that Ylönen would have to be living under a rock not to be aware of OpenSSH before now. OpenSSH, released in December 1999 and in use before that, was used by more than 17% of all SSH users earlier this month, according to a study published on the University of Alberta Web site." Besides that, the story does a great job of listing other people whose products including "SSH" in their names have been left blissfully alone, making it seem that OpenSSH is getting what can only be called special treatment.

Of interest: here is a link to a page at openssh.com showing the legal papers received and scanned by members of the OpenSSH project, including the trademark application in question, showing an entirely lowercased "ssh" as the applied-for mark.