On Patenting Flat Fields

Just saw this story about identifying digital cameras by their noise patterns linked off of boing boing.

Just wanted to point out that it appears these researchers are patenting an algorithm for identifying a camera's flat field response. Shouldn't astronomers get some royalties out of this since we've been doing this for what 20 years? Maybe we can point to this as another spin-off of astronomical research?

So, next time someone asks you why we should invest in basic science like astronomy, tell them that a standard astronomical data analysis technique is now used for catching child pornographers.