Search Results for: customer list

“It’s a Free Country, Right?” Court Declines to Enjoin Ex-Free Country Ltd. Employees From Contacting Customers on Purloined Contact List

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Within days of each other, your clothing company―Free Country Ltd.―loses two employees who decamp to a rival to set up a competing apparel line.  You discover that just before leaving, they transferred some 50,000 documents to a personal account—customer orders, your master contact list, and product design information.  Incensed, you file a trade secrets lawsuit […]

In Hawaii, “Aloha” May Mean Both Hello and Goodbye, But When Employees Leave, Who Owns the Customer Relationships?

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As we’ve observed over the years, when addressing trade secrets claims based on customer lists, courts have landed all over the place. These cases involve difficult questions such as when an employee develops relationships on behalf of Company A but then leaves for Company B, who “owns” those relationships? A recent federal district court decision […]

Baring It All: Judge Orders Swingers’ Club to Produce Email Distribution List

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A recent case in the Southern District of Florida serves as a reminder that even trade secrets may be subject to production to opposing counsel. Magistrate Judge Jonathan Goodman recently ordered a defendant “swingers’” club to produce its email distribution list to plaintiffs in Edmonson v. Velvet Lifestyles, LLC (S.D. Fla. Dec. 5, 2016).

FOURTH OF JULY EDITION: Family Fireworks: Plot to Steal Client Lists Goes up in Smoke

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For many, Fourth of July festivities wouldn’t be complete without a baseball game, a family barbecue, and of course, fireworks.  But for one family-operated fireworks company in California, its members had an unhappy reunion in court when a great-grandson’s decision to leave the family business exploded into a dazzling dispute over trade secrets. According to […]

#SecretTweets: Protecting Social Media as a Trade Secret?

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Social media today connects people more than ever. It can be a means to bring together long-lost friends, new acquaintances, and love interests, or the public with celebrities, sports teams, new products, and companies—to name just a few. It can be an effective way to market images and products, as it has the potential to […]

Campaigning for Protection of Political Trade Secrets

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As widely reported, on April 20, the Democratic National Committee (“DNC”) kicked off a twelve count lawsuit against a number of entities and individuals, including the Russian Federation, General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (“GRU”), WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, Donald J. Trump, Jr., and other political foes.  Amongst the wide swath of […]

Making a Federal Case Out of It: What Does the DTSA’s “Interstate Commerce” Limitation Mean?

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We’ve blogged a lot about the Defend Trade Secrets Act in the roughly year-and-a-half period since the law was enacted.  Our coverage has run the gamut:  from the first jury verdict under the DTSA, to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s emerging interest in trade secrets, to the once-controversial ex parte seizure provision that, so […]

Pushing the Envelope: Eight Circuit Seals the Fate of Envelope Company’s Trade Secret Claims

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On December 8, 2017, the Eighth Circuit rejected trade secrets and other claims related to allegedly stolen customer lists.  Applying Missouri state law, the federal appellate court continued the Show-Me State’s tradition of looking at customer list trade secrets with a jaundiced eye.

Trade Secret Misappropriation by Ex-Employees in China: How to Confront “Inside Theft”

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Article 123 of the General Provisions of the Civil Law of the People’s Republic of China (effective Oct. 1, 2017) confirmed that trade secrets are intellectual property, signifying China’s recognition of the importance of trade secret protection.  Nevertheless, trade secret misappropriation remains rampant in the country. 

TOTAL ECLIPSE EDITION: Trade Secret Disputes That Are Out of This World

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Take off your eclipse glasses, close that NASA photo gallery, and stop thinking about how “path of totality” would make an awesome band name: it’s time to get back to work. As the country recovers from Eclipse Mania 2017, we take a look at some space-related trade secrets cases. Turn Around… Someone might be stealing […]