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The VoIP handset runs a version of Linux developed by Cisco-subsidiary Linksys from code publicly available under the GPL open source licence. Under the terms of that licence, Linksys is obliged to release the altered code back to the open source community.

Armijn Hemel, a member the GPL Violations Project, which tracks GPL violations,

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discovered the alleged violation after reverse-engineering the phone's firmware - having checked with a lawyer that it was legal to do so. He subsequently discovered that Cisco had not shared the code for two of the phone's applications.

Hemel reported the omissions to Cisco last October and was only prompted to go public following Cisco's announcement that it plans to take legal action over Apple's use of the iPhone name for its new mobile phone-iPod hybrid.

'For someone talking about Apple using Cisco's property, actually they're infringing on copyright themselves,' he said. 'So it's just a double standard.'

Should Cisco fail to publish the code, which Hemel accepted is a complex process, then it could face legal action from the GPL Violations Project, which already has 100 successful enforcements to its name. Individual programmers who contributed to the original code that Cisco used would also be entitled to seek compensation for breach of copyright.

Cisco declined to comment.