Lawsuit against Google revived

Google Inc., owner of the most frequently used Internet search engine, must answer a Wisconsin company’s lawsuit over a browser toolbar feature that generates Web links from computer search data, a federal appeals court decided Wednesday.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit revived part of HyperPhrase Technologies’ lawsuit, throwing out a lower court ruling that Google’s AutoLink feature didn’t infringe the company’s patents.

As part of the Google toolbar, AutoLink gives users more information than standard links. It recognizes data such as addresses and book titles, then provides links to online maps or books at Amazon.com.

HyperPhrase also had targeted Google’s AdSense, a technology that lets companies run text ads relevant to the content on their websites. The appeals court said AdSense didn’t infringe HyperPhrase’s patents.

HyperPhrase claimed in an April 2006 suit that Google used its inventions without permission. It sought cash compensation and an order blocking Mountain View, Calif.-based Google from using the technology.