DSLnetworks Sues Covad

DSLnetworks, an Internet service provider whose customers lost high-speed access last week when Covad Communications Inc. cut the connection, fired back by suing Covad. In its suit, San Francisco-based DSLnetworks contends that Covad has been contacting its 3,500 affected customers and asking them to sign up for DSL service directly with Covad. Covad sells high-speed digital subscriber lines to Internet service providers, which in turn sell them to businesses and residential users. Last week, Covad unplugged DSLnetworks and another service provider, Internet Express, for failing to pay bills totaling millions of dollars. The lawsuit, filed in Santa Clara County Superior Court, asks that Covad be ordered to stop contacting DSLnetworks’ customers. A Covad spokeswoman said the company had not been served with the lawsuit and could not comment.