UK judge slams Apple’s “lack of integrity” over Samsung apology farce

A UK judge has slammed Apple’s “lack of integrity” over the way it has conducted itself after it was ordered to place a notice on its website informing users that Samsung was found not guilty of design patent infringement.

The long-running saga revolves around a case between the two firms in the country relating to the design of Samsung’s Galaxy Tab. An original case and a subsequent appeal both found for Samsung.

In a unique twist, the judge overseeing the case ordered Apple to display a note on its website and publish adverts in magazines and newspapers explaining to the public that Samsung had been found not guilty, in order to clear up any confusion.

However, Apple’s initial apology was challenged by Samsung over its wording and references to other cases in the US and Germany where Apple had won against Samsung.

UK judge Robin Jacob agreed it has failed to comply with the order and was angered by Apple’s stance, especially when it claimed it would need 14 days to amend the text page on its website containing the notice, in an court ruling on 1 November.

In his subsequent written judgment explaining his decision he again gave a dim view of Apple’s action around the case.

“I hope that the lack of integrity involved in this incident is entirely atypical of Apple,” he wrote in his judgment published on Friday morning.

As part of the judgment Apple had amend its notice and publish a second note con its front page concerning the first statement, acknowledging it had not complied with the order.

Apple did this but hid it below the fold of the front page using a piece of code to ensure users only saw it if they scrolled down to the bottom of the page. 

Apple has now removed this code, although only those with large-screen high-resolution displays now see it directly.

On our 13in MacBook Pro for example you still need to scroll down to see it, and a similar test on a Windows 7 laptop revealed the same.