On-line ad company Gator has bitten back against recent lawsuits by launching its own case against a business that has complained about its pop-up ads.
US-based Gator Corp provides free software to consumers that enables them to store information such as passwords for logging onto sites. The catch however is that users of its software must agree to receive ads in return and when they visit certain Web sites a code is triggered that inundates them with pop-up ads. And, very often, the owners of these sites have not agreed to display these ads.
This has led to several companies such as the Washington Post and United Parcel Service (UPS) suing Gator for infringing on their sites. UPS, for instance, charged that it led to its competitors" ads appearing on its Web site.
However, now Gator has decided to turn the tables and has set the lawyers on Extended Stay America Inc to ensure that Extended cannot block its ads, a report on Bloomberg claims. Gator"s argument is that consumers should be able to decide what they see on the Web and not Web site owners. It said in its suit that Extended Stay America has no right to prevent computer users from choosing to get its software and "viewing separate works, comprising advertising on that user"s own computer screen, even when other works share the screen."