After thinking about this for a bit - I bet the third party ink refill manufactures would win in court if they sued for the codes needed. There are many laws in place already - most of them were written with cars in mind, but they are broad enough to apply to printers.
However it would be several million in legal fees to do this and I'm not sure if they make enough on refill to pay the lawyers. Unless they can convince the courts to give them legal fees as well.
There are still millions (probably hundreds of millions) of consumer grade printers out there. That is a lot of money for the refill makers to work with.
However it would be several million in legal fees to do this and I'm not sure if they make enough on refill to pay the lawyers. Unless they can convince the courts to give them legal fees as well.