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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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Earlier this month, we reported that Apple had announced upcoming changes to the behavior of VPN On Demand for devices running iOS 6.1 or later. The changes, which were planned to be deployed in a software update later this month, were necessitated by a $368 million judgment against Apple in a patent lawsuit brought by VirnetX.

Virtual private networking (VPN), which is most commonly used by corporate users to access company networks, allows a user to securely connect to a private network via public networks as if his or her device were directly on the private network.

vpn_settings_on_ios.jpg
Apple's changes to the feature were to see the removal of the "Always" configuration option for VPN On Demand, with the behavior defaulting back to an "Establish if needed" option. That option does not, however, perform ideally under certain circumstances, leading Apple to suggest that users may need to resort to turning VPN On Demand on and off manually, a potentially significant inconvenience.

The patent judgment covered previous infringement by Apple but did not address future use of VirnetX's intellectual property, and it seems that Apple had decided to simply remove the "Always" feature from iOS rather than agree to an additional licensing deal with VirnetX.

But it now appears that the two sides may have reached an agreement, as Apple on Wednesday updated its support document on the issue to note that it no longer plans to make the previously announced change.
Apple no longer plans to change the behavior of the VPN On Demand feature of iOS 6.1 for devices that have already been shipped. The "Always" option will continue to work as it currently does on these devices.
It is, however, currently unclear why Apple specifically mentions that it will not be changing the VPN ON Demand feature on "devices that have already been shipped", leaving open the possibility that it may make changes to devices that have yet to ship.

Apple's proposed changes had brought significant scrutiny from the enterprise-focused security community, with security firm Mobile Active Defense having released a detailed whitepaper (PDF) highlighting numerous issues with Apple's proposed changes.

(Thanks, Jorge!)

Update: Computerworld notes that in its 10-Q regulatory filing earlier this week, Apple reported that it is continuing to challenge the $368 million judgment in VirnetX's favor. The move suggests that Apple may simply be delaying making any changes to VPN On Demand until the case has run its course rather than the two companies having reached a licensing agreement.

Article Link: Apple Backtracks on Planned Changes to VPN On Demand Behavior on iOS Devices
 

SteveLV702

macrumors 6502
Oct 15, 2007
338
31
Las Vegas, Nevada
How do you setup the "Always" on cause I've always had to manually turn my VPN Manually ON... dont have to manually turn off it turns off all by itself... as soon as screen goes to sleep it disconnects which drives me crazy...
 

jan1024188

macrumors member
Apr 27, 2011
79
95
Oh crap this really sucks. I use VPN's all the time...oh wait, I don't even have an iPhone. Nevermind.
 

Trik

macrumors 6502
Jan 18, 2011
370
1,176
Washington, DC
I wonder if this was a bluff on Apple's part to get them to drop the licensing fees. As in,
:apple: "Fine we'll take it off entirely, and you won't get a dime from now on"
VirnetX: "No way you'll do that"
:apple:**insert 6.1 release notes**
VirnetX: "Ok ok, we'll drop the price."

**Tim Cook sips his Mai Tai**
 
Last edited:

whooleytoo

macrumors 604
Aug 2, 2002
6,607
716
Cork, Ireland.
"Apple says they don't infringe. But Apple developers testified that they didn't pay any attention to anyone's patents when developing their system."

Comment from the lawyer representing VirnetX. To me, that just seems to be acknowledging Apple didn't copy VirnetX, they just unwittingly ran into a 'roadblock' patent. While that makes no difference to the lawsuit, it does highlight that patents are just being given out too easily - including to Apple.
 

shiftless

macrumors member
Sep 19, 2012
45
0
How do you setup the "Always" on cause I've always had to manually turn my VPN Manually ON... dont have to manually turn off it turns off all by itself... as soon as screen goes to sleep it disconnects which drives me crazy...

This...

Where is the "Always" setting?
 

WildCowboy

Administrator/Editor
Staff member
Jan 20, 2005
18,358
2,769
How do you setup the "Always" on cause I've always had to manually turn my VPN Manually ON... dont have to manually turn off it turns off all by itself... as soon as screen goes to sleep it disconnects which drives me crazy...

It's generally set up at the enterprise level using iPhone Configuration Utility and pushed out to devices as a configuration profile.

VPN On Demand
 

unlinked

macrumors 6502a
Jul 12, 2010
698
1,217
Ireland
"Apple says they don't infringe. But Apple developers testified that they didn't pay any attention to anyone's patents when developing their system."

Comment from the lawyer representing VirnetX. To me, that just seems to be acknowledging Apple didn't copy VirnetX, they just unwittingly ran into a 'roadblock' patent. While that makes no difference to the lawsuit, it does highlight that patents are just being given out too easily - including to Apple.

I think developers are instructed not to look at patents because if you know about them then any infringement can be found to be willful and the judgement against you will be larger.

Anytime I have looked at a patent is has left me more confused than informed so I'm pretty sure the whole system is failing at at least half its purpose.
 

smithrh

macrumors 68030
Feb 28, 2009
2,722
1,730
I think developers are instructed not to look at patents because if you know about them then any infringement can be found to be willful and the judgement against you will be larger.

Exactly right.
 

melgross

macrumors 6502
Jan 23, 2004
446
394
New York City
The "already shipped" comment isn't so hard to understand. Apple has now paid for all past infringing devices, so those devices are licensed to use the software as is.

Whether they will pay a license for new devices is still not known.
 

JHankwitz

macrumors 68000
Oct 31, 2005
1,911
58
Wisconsin
I’ll hazard a guess that the only people interested in this, are currently making money, not browsing MacRumors ;)

So very true. VPN users are currently using their corporate equipment and networks, so are not allowed to be wasting company resources visiting a rumor site. Those not on VPN could cate less about it.
 

CallMeSizzle

macrumors newbie
Apr 5, 2013
6
2
The "already shipped" comment isn't so hard to understand. Apple has now paid for all past infringing devices, so those devices are licensed to use the software as is.

Whether they will pay a license for new devices is still not known.


NOT TRUE...Apple hasn't paid a dime yet and is still infringing without a license. The Products that came after this lawsuit are part of a second suit that has yet to come to trial. It is likely that if they reach an agreement it will be for everything and the second suit will be dropped.

----------

I wonder if this was a bluff on Apple's part to get them to drop the licensing fees. As in,
:apple: "Fine we'll take it off entirely, and you won't get a dime from now on"
VirnetX: "No way you'll do that"
:apple:**insert 6.1 release notes**
VirnetX: "Ok ok, we'll drop the price."

**Tim Cook sips his Mai Tai**

That is one wishful thinking way to be thinking about it. More like this:

Apple: Well, we steal we don't pay
Court: You must pay
VirnetX: This is our rate
Apple: No way. We will just come up with a workaround!
VirnetX: Good luck with that.
Users: Hey Apple, WTF is going on with VPN???
User: Hey WTF is up with iMessage and FaceTime??? They keep going down!
Apple: Uh..how much do we need to pay again?

While Tim Cook reads rumors of big investors asking for him to be replaced
 

haravikk

macrumors 65816
May 1, 2005
1,499
21
I think developers are instructed not to look at patents because if you know about them then any infringement can be found to be willful and the judgement against you will be larger.
And it wastes a fantastic amount of time to try to look up patents for every little thing you add, especially when practically any line of code these days is potentially something that's been patented judging by a lot of the recent cases.

If you have to stop every five seconds to look up whether a particular usage of a socket, for loop or increment has been patented, then it just plain stops developers from doing what they're supposed to be doing; developing. This is why big companies have legal teams to look for possible conflicts, but then they don't necessarily know enough about the specifics to be able to find exact matches anyway; there are a lot of patents out there, and nearly all of them are worded in incredibly unhelpful language that makes the concept as vague as possible to all involved in the hopes of it being applicable to something only loosely related for maximum profit from zero actual development work.


Sorry, I just really hate the stupidity in patents, and yet nothing is being done to actually fix the damn things.
 

Marlor

macrumors regular
Jun 21, 2005
233
65
This is a big win.

We would have needed to totally change the way we deploy iPhones if this happened. It would have broken our security model and denied access to many intranet sites.

I spent a week trying to create a workaround, but there was none that would keep full functionality.
 

SiriusExcelsior

macrumors regular
Dec 6, 2003
115
4
Canis Major
Sorry, I just really hate the stupidity in patents, and yet nothing is being done to actually fix the damn things.

It's just stupid the amount of effort and money you have to spend to find if someone, somewhere has already done the same thing you just "made". Most of the time you'll only find out when a lawyer comes knocking on your doors...

It'd be nice if you are allowed to "reinvent" things and use what you have without paying if you can prove you independently came up with something (R&D notes, etc), since you'll have made the investment in developing that too (which is the whole point of patents, right?), but that system's going to be hell to administer and enforce... :(
 

chikin

macrumors newbie
Apr 27, 2013
1
0
Instead of screwing your customers with this annoying workaround, Apple, how about you just spend a minuscule fraction of your eleventy billion dollars and just license the damned patent? For eff's sake, Tim, you're way ahead in the market. Stop acting as if Apple's the one always being slighted.
 
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