Apple has been awarded a multitouch user interface patent by the US Patent and Trademark Office—a patent that has sparked debate among Apple watchers regarding whether it's broad enough to concern Apple's competitors or not.

The patent itself was filed in 2007 and describes methods for interacting with a webpage or other screen element using one or more fingers, depending on what the user is trying to do. For example, one finger might be used to scroll or move the screen around (a la moving the map around on Google's mobile Maps page), while two fingers might be used to pinch or zoom on certain details within that page or element. The patent doesn't go into much detail on the GUIs on the device that hosts the screen elements, nor does it expand its description to explain other forms of multitouch functionality.

The immediate reaction from much of the blogosphere was to declare the patent overly broad and a possible threat to other smartphone makers that make use of multitouch. PC Magazine, for example, cited an unnamed source who claimed the patent gives Apple "ownership of the capacitive multitouch interface the company pioneered with its iPhone." That source also went on to say that the patent is "likely to produce a new round of lawsuits over the now-ubiquitous multitouch interfaces used in smartphones made by the likes of HTC, Samsung, Motorola, Research in Motion, Nokia, and others that run operating systems similar in nature to Apple's iOS, like Google's Android."

A number of patent experts who spoke to Macworld seemed to agree that the patent may be a bit broad, but the VP of law policy at the Computer and Communications Industry Association Matt Schruers hesitated to declare that it wouldn't hold up in court. Instead, he suggested that other companies may begin trying to strike deals with Apple. "Patents like this create uncertainty, which generally leads to negotiations," Schruers said. "Patent lawyers for Apple show up with a big stack of accordion files, Google’s lawyers come with their stack, and back-room patent cross-licensing begins."

Others disagree, arguing that the patent isn't nearly as broad as it seems upon first blush. Nilay Patel, intellectual property lawyer and former Engadget editor (now at This is my Next), told Ars that the patent's claims are "fairly narrow." Patel notes that they require single-finger scrolling along with reprinted scrolling within a frame on a website (think an embedded Google Map, like our example above). "Also, it only applies to Web browsers on mobile devices, not multitouch in general," Patel said. "[B]asically no one's read the claims carefully enough." (Patel has written more analysis on the patent at This is my Next.)

A blog called Litigating Apple is also on Patel's side, writing: "You don't have to be a patent attorney or a paranoid Apple competitor to understand that this patent doesn't afford Apple broad patent coverage over all capacitive multi-touch interfaces."

What's clear is that Apple's recent moves to aggressively defend its intellectual property has left everyone on edge—so much so that even the narrowest of patents are now receiving extra scrutiny from experts and non-experts alike. After all, the company is currently involved in legal battles with Samsung, HTC, and Motorola, though it recently settled its patent dispute with Nokia. It's too early to tell whether Apple plans to use its new multitouch patent to its legal advantage, but we expect that Apple's competitors will be keeping an eye on the company.