The latest lawsuit comes on the heels of another Cable & Wireless complaint last month that Akamai's flagship EdgeSuite and Akamaizer product sets use technology and software that is covered by U.S. patent number 6,415,280, which is owned by the British telco. The patent covers ways to optimize CDNs (define) and the way in which content delivery networks handle requests.

"The injunction request is one aspect of what is expected to be a multi-year effort to protect Cable & Wireless' intellectual property and defend its status as the first inventor of CDN technology. The company expects to continue to pursue patent protection covering its CDN technology," Cable and Wireless said in a statement.

The company said the patent "goes to the very core of how Akamai operates its so-called content delivery network," which handles the flow of Web data over networks and servers.

Earlier this week, the Cambridge, Mass.-based Akamai claimed victory over Cable & Wireless in a suit that covered patent for CDNs.

A federal judge in Boston ordered C&W to stop using Internet content delivery network technology (CDN) that infringes on patents held by Akamai.

Akamai hailed the injunction as a "major victory" while C&W shrugged it off, saying it no longer uses the technology in question. "We will now turn our attention to seeking full compensation from Cable & Wireless for the long-standing infringement of this patent," said Akamai boss George Conrades.

Akamai spokesman Jeff Young shrugged off the latest C&W lawsuit. "There is no news here. This (patent claim) has already been discussed," Young said, noting that the latest claim is "just another version of the fingerprint technology that a jury previously determined that akamai does not infringe."

"This does not affect our business in any way. We are confident that we do not infringe. It is interesting that the timing of this re-release of an old claim comes just after we won an injunction to terminally shut down their footprint 2.0 service," he added.

Earlier this week Akamai's patent counsel David Judson poured cold water on what he described as C&W's "post-trial attempts to design around these claims." After winning the court order, Akamai announced plans to seek "full compensation" from C&W.

Cable & Wireless' service, previously known as Digital Island 2.0, is now sold under the Exodus name.

The dispute erupted in July 2002 when C&W slapped a lawsuit against Akamai alleging that technology with the EdgeSuite and Akamaizer tools "directly infringe" on its patent.

There is also another C&W lawsuit wending its way through the courts, which claimed Akamai infringes on patents in the Host-to-Host Adaptive Routing Protocol (HHARP). That protocol uses an overlay network for optimal routing, improving the reliability and performance of Internet packet-routing systems by using redundant network paths intelligently.