Akamai was granted a permanent injunction against rival Digital Island's content delivery service by a Federal Court in Boston yesterday.

In a statement, Akamai welcomed the ruling said Digital Island cannot effectively operate its content delivery service without violating key aspects of a disputed patent.

In December last year, a jury found DI's Footprint service infringes the parts of US patent 6,108,703, the so-called "Leighton-Lewin patent", which cover a "two-level DNS" method used by both Akamai and DI to route web traffic to edge-of-network caches.

However Digital Island dismissed the ruling as a "legal technicality" about a legacy part of its content delivery network. Customers will be unaffected by the injunction, it says.

Judge Rya Zobel has retired to establish the final wording of the injunction to be granted against Digital Island's Footprint service. Digital Island, despite downplaying the significance of the injunction, has pledged to appeal to the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals.

Both parties expect the case to go to trial next year. ®

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