Trade Secrets
Trade secrets can be considered as secrets that are actually or potentially a privilege for the owner of a business. Since these secrets have economic value, they may always be tampered with by unconventional people. In any business, hiding some information is a common and undeniable thing. In other words, in our business field, we are faced with technology and some capabilities that we don’t want our competitors and customers to know about. In fact, we can say that we are the owner of a type of property, which is referred to as trade secrets.
Knowledge of Trade Secrets
Trade secrets are valuable information that must remain confidential. These secrets cannot be supported and protected through the methods of intellectual property law; Because they are not registered in a place that falls under this law. Therefore, people should try to protect them. Losing confidential information is very easy. They may be completely stolen through electronic transfers or leaked outside the company by employees, willingly or unwillingly.
Knowing one thing to understand the need to protect these secrets will be efficient; Trade secrets somehow create a competitive advantage for the business and put it in a more ideal situation.
Examples of Trade Secrets
In general, anything that has an independent economic value for the company can be considered as a trade secret. But as an example, we can mention the following:
1. Unique trading techniques
2. Production methods
3. Customer information
4. Business methods and patterns
Features of Trade Secrets
In order for our business and company information to be recognized as confidential and protected by law, it must have 3 features:
1. Inaccessible
Secret information is information that is not easily accessible to the public. Information that is easily accessible to the public is not considered a trade secret.
2. Economic Value
Information that is introduced as trade secrets must have actual or potential economic value. In other words, in order to prove that the information we mention under this title is really confidential, we must prove how this information gives our company a competitive and economic advantage over other companies.
3. Action to Protect
A company that claims to have confidential and secret information must prove that it has taken and continues to take correct and appropriate measures to maintain their secrets and confidentiality.
Protection of Trade Secrets
According to the type of secrets we believe to be confidential, we will have different methods to keep it safe
1. Keeping them in an archive and a protected place
2. Limiting employees’ access to information and making it available only to people who need it
3. Emphasizing to the employees that this information is part of the company’s secrets and they must ensure their security when using it.
4. Use passwords
Up To Sum
Some types of intellectual property in all businesses are considered trade secrets. Due to the role of competitive and economic advantage that such cases play for every business, keeping these secrets and ensuring their security is necessary and unavoidable. These secrets can exist in different forms within the organization; including marketing techniques, production methods, company customer information, etc. But all of these things must have 3 important features to be considered as corporate secrets; are not accessible to the public, have economic value and necessary measures have been taken to protect their security.
