Transcript Document

5.1
Chapter 5
Trade Secrets and
Database Protection
© 2003 by West Legal Studies in Business/A Division of Thomson Learning
Sources of Trade
Secret Law
Roman Empire
law, extended to
English common
law
Uniform Trade
Secrets Act of
1979
Restatement of
Torts of 1939
The Economic
Espionage Act of
1996
5.2
Subject Matter of
Trade Secrets
 Definitions
 Restatement
of Torts
 UTSA
 EEA
 Customer information
 Trade secrets in software
 Trade secrets on the Internet
5.3
Acquisition, Control,
and Ownership
 Reasonable efforts to maintain
secrecy
 Reasonable security
precautions
Information-centered
controls
Employee-centered controls
Outsider-centered controls
5.4
Acquisition, Control,
and Ownership
 Commercial value
 Use causing damage
 Trade secret ownership
5.5
5.6
Misappropriation
Improper
means
Receipt
Disclosure
Use
Defenses to
Misappropriation
 Independent development
 Innocent receipt
 Reverse engineering
 Information already in the
public domain
 Other defenses to
misappropriation
5.7
5.8
Remedies
Injunctions
 Most
basic and immediate remedy
 Should
be limited to the time the
information remains secret
Money damages
Owner must prove compensatory
damage amount
Protection of Databases:
Tort Theories
 Database defined
 Data warehouses and data
mining
 Hot news
 Trespass to chattels
 Data aggregation
 Shopping bots
5.9
Other Protection
of Databases
Compilation
Technical and contract protections
Sui Generis Data Base Protection
EU Database Protection Directive
5.10