In addition, although we require our third-party developers to sign agreements not to disclose or improperly use our trade secrets, to acknowledge that all inventions, trade secrets, works of authorship, developments and other processes generated by them on our behalf are our property and to assign to us any ownership they may have in those works, it may still be possible for third parties to obtain and improperly use our intellectual properties without our consent. This could harm our brand, business, operating results and financial condition.
We are, and in the future may become, involved in intellectual property disputes, which may disrupt our business, require us to pay significant damage awards and could limit our ability to use certain technologies in the future.
Third parties may sue us for intellectual property infringement, or initiate proceedings to invalidate our intellectual property, which, if successful, could disrupt our business, cause us to pay significant damage awards or require us to pay licensing fees. For example, in July 2018, SwiftLife, Inc. filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York against us, our wholly owned subsidiary Glu Games Inc., and Taylor Swift, Taylor Swift Productions, Inc. and TAS Rights Management, LLC. The complaint alleged eight causes of action, including that Glu and the other defendants infringe the plaintiff’s federally registered trademark, SwiftLife. While we were able to successfully resolve this matter without paying any amounts to the plaintiff, the outcome of any litigation is uncertain and, regardless of outcome, litigation can have an adverse impact on us because of defense costs, potential negative publicity, diversion of management resources and other factors. In addition, any claims brought against us in the future could result in our being enjoined from using our intellectual property or licensed intellectual property, and we might incur significant licensing fees and could be forced to develop alternative technologies. We may also be required to pay penalties, judgments, royalties or significant settlement costs. If we fail or are unable to develop non-infringing technology or games or to license the infringed or similar technology or games on a timely basis, we may be forced to withdraw games from the market or be prevented from introducing new games. We might also incur substantial expenses in defending against third-party claims, regardless of their merit.
In addition, we use open source software in some of our games and expect to continue to use open source software in the future. We may face claims from companies that incorporate open source software into their products, claiming ownership of, or demanding release of, the source code, the open source software and/or derivative works that were developed using such software, or otherwise seeking to enforce the terms of the applicable open source license. These claims could also result in litigation, require us to purchase a costly license or require us to devote additional research and development resources to change our games, any of which would have a negative effect on our business and operating results.
We are, and in the future may become a party to litigation and regulatory inquiries, which could result in an unfavorable outcome and have an adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operation and cash flows.
We are, and may become in the future, subject to various legal proceedings, claims and regulatory inquiries that arise out of the ordinary conduct of our business. The outcome of any litigation is uncertain and, regardless of outcome, litigation can have an adverse impact on us because of defense costs, potential negative publicity, diversion of management resources and other factors. In addition, events may occur that give rise to a potential risk of litigation. The number and significance of regulatory inquiries have increased as our business has grown and evolved. Any proceedings, claims or inquiries initiated by or against us, whether successful or not, may be time consuming; result in costly litigation, damage awards, consent decrees, injunctive relief or increased costs of doing business, require us to change our business practices or products, require significant amounts of management time, result in diversion of significant operations resources or otherwise harm our business and future financial results.
Unanticipated changes in our income tax rates or exposure to additional tax liabilities may affect our future financial results.
Our future effective income tax rates may be favorably or unfavorably affected by unanticipated changes in the valuation of our deferred tax assets and liabilities, or by changes in tax laws or their interpretation. Determining our worldwide provision for income taxes requires significant judgments. The estimation process and applicable laws are inherently uncertain, and our estimates are not binding on tax authorities. Our effective tax rate could also be adversely