FaceTec filed its patent infringement lawsuit in June, accusing Jumio of copying its Zoom software, a key tool in facial recognition technology that verifies the authenticity of a human face. Jumio had previously licensed the software from FaceTec, according to court filings.
In November, FaceTec sent Perkins Coie a letter claiming that the firm’s prior work for the company created a conflict of interest. The law firm had provided legal services to FaceTec from 2014 until January 2024, FaceTec argued, and now Perkins Coie was working to dismiss the very patents it had helped FaceTec secure. FaceTec filed the formal disqualification motion in December.
Perkins Coie, however, provided a different account in its opposition. The firm said it had never worked directly on any of the four patents in the lawsuit, and that its relationship with FaceTec was limited. The law firm emphasized that it only occasionally assisted FaceTec from 2014 to 2017. After two years of inactivity, Perkins Coie closed the account in 2019 and began representing Jumio.
