YOU!
Maybe you can help us plebes understand the validity of the patents in play here. Most of us don't understand, for example, why slide to unlock, or even data synchronization were allowed a patents.
Would take quite a bit of time, unfortunately. Time that I do not have to donate.
The long and short of it, however, would be that the USPTO determined after a search that the claims of each of the patents in question defined subject matter that was both novel (not anticipated) and non-obvious as of the respective patent's earliest effective filing date.
If you want to try analyzing the validity of the patents yourself, you might try the following:
1. Read the patents.
2. Carefully read the claims.
3. Construe the claim terms in accordance with U.S. law (basically in view of the specification and potentially outside sources, expert testimony, etc.).
4. Once you have construed the claims - search the prior art (with some exceptions, basically anything published, on sale, in public use, etc. before the priority date of the application (actual filing date or priority date claimed under 35 USC 119 or 120)).
5. Try to identify anticipatory prior art (prior art literally teaches each element of at least one claim.
6. If no anticipatory prior art or if you have some dependent claims that were not anticipated, try to find art that renders those claims obvious under 103 (basically reference A teaches elements X and Y, reference B teaches element Z, it would have been obvious to combine Z with X and Y for some rational reason spelled out in the references or using technical argument not fundamentally based on hindsight).
7. If you can find art to legitimately reject all the claims under 102/103. . . you may have an argument that the patent is invalid.
8. If you can't find art to legitimately reject at least one claim under 102/103 . . . you may have an argument that some claims are invalid, while others are potentially valid.
Of course, none of the above is legal advice. Just posted to give you guys some idea of how complex and time consuming this type of thing can be. I've rendered some validity opinions for $8k, and some for $100k+. All depends on how many issues are raised and how important/complex those issues are. So again, determining validity is not always the easiest thing to do. Particularly when the other side will come up with often equally convincing arguments in support of a position precisely opposite yours.
