Cyberlaw Topics: Trade Secret Law
This site contains an overview of Trade Secret Law issues, including:
Trade Secret Legislation
Trade Secret Topics
Selected Cases
Selected Articles and Reports
Other Useful Links
Economic Espionage Act of 1996
The EEA makes the theft or misappropriation of trade secrets a criminal offense, and is the first federal law that purports to both broadly define and severely punish such misappropriation and theft.
Uniform Trade Secrets Act with 1985 amendments
The Uniform Act codifies the basic principles of common law trade secret protection, preserving its essential distinctions from patent law.
Trade Secret Topics
Inevitable Disclosure of Trade Secrets
By I. N. Feinberg. Discussion on the "inevitable disclosure" doctrine, under which an employee may be prohibited from performing work competitive with his former employer if a court decides that he will "inevitably disclose" his former employer's trade secrets.
Nondisclosure Agreements
By Nolo Press. Learn about the best way for a business to protect its trade secrets. A nondisclosure agreement -- also called an NDA or confidentiality agreement -- is a contract in which the parties promise to protect the confidentiality of secret information that is disclosed during employment or another type of business transaction.
Patent, Trademark, and Trade Secret Law
By Cyberspace and New Media Law Center. This site discusses the difference between Patent, Trademark and Trade Secret Law.
Some Economics of Trade Secret Law
By D. Friedman, W. Landes, and R. Posner. Despite the practical importance of trade secrets to the business community, the law of trade secrets is a neglected orphan in economic analysis. This paper sketches an approach to the economics of trade secret law that connects it more closely both to other areas of intellectual property and to broader issues in the positive economic theory of the common law.
Trade Secret Basics FAQ
By Nolo Press. Questions and answers that explain what every business owner should know about trade secret law.
Trade Secrets Home Page
By R. M. Halligan. An online guide to the interesting and sometimes complex law of Trade Secrets.
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Selected CasesCalifornia Supreme Court Hears DVD Trade Secret Case
By EFF. "The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the First Amendment Project today asked the California Supreme Court to affirm an appeals court decision permitting publication of software pending a lower court's ruling on a trade secret case. In a tremendous victory for freedom of speech on the Internet, the appeals court had overturned a lower court injunction against publication of the software based on the publisher's First Amendment rights."
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Selected Articles and ReportsWatch Your Step With Secrets
By J. Littman, Information Week. When leaving a job, it's wise to leave behind anything remotely resembling a trade secret
Nolo Patent & Trade Secrets
Nolo is an organization that helps people handle their own everyday legal matters -- or learn enough about them to make working with a lawyer a more satisfying experience -- They publish reliable, plain-English books, software, forms and this website, including patent and trade secret legal information for protecting your invention, nondisclosure agreements and more.
Trade Secret Office, Inc.
The Trade Secret Office® is a private company that developed technology for the identification and protection of trade secret rights. This patent-pending technology is revolutionary and will provide immediate solutions to longstanding problems of asset valuation faced by the accounting, banking, insurance, licensing and legal professions.
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