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Apple’s voice-based personal assistant, Siri, has been hailed by many as the best software of its kind. In fact, it was precisely what became the selling point for iPhone 4S over iPhone 4. But at the same time, Siri has been embroiled in many legal issues. Some said they were disillusioned by it and others accused Apple of false marketing. Now, someone else is here to join the group.

A lawsuit has now been launched by the National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan. The university believes that Apple has used two of its speech-recognition patents in Siri without ever seeking permission or paying for it.

Naturally, the university is now seeking damages for the alleged patent infringement. To cite its claim, the university has presented two US Patents – 7,707,032 and 7,266,496 – titled “Method and System for Matching Speech Data” and “Speech Recognition System”, respectively.

This first of the two patents was originally filed in 2005, and was granted in 2010. It is a method of determining similarity of input speech and sample speech.

The second patent was awarded for a complete speech recognition system. According to the University, “The ‘496 Patent is generally directed to a complete speech recognition system having a training button and a recognition button, and the whole system uses the application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) architecture for the design, and also uses the modular design to divide the speech processing into 4 modules: system control module, autocorrelation and linear predictive coefficient module, cepstrum module, and DTW recognition module as used with the with a device, such as smartphone or tablet.”

Although the University is suing Apple for damages, it hasn’t specified what amount it is looking for. However, it did make clear, as long as Apple kept using the patents, the damages will mount.

Courtesy: Patently Apple