What Constitutes Corporate Espionage Fraud?
Corporate espionage fraud involves illegally obtaining confidential business information from a competitor to gain an unfair advantage. This can include:
- Stealing trade secrets or proprietary technology
- Hacking into computer systems to access sensitive data
- Using deception to obtain confidential documents
- Bribing or blackmailing employees to reveal inside information
- Industrial sabotage to damage a competitor’s operations
1. Lack of Intent
2. Information Was Not Actually a Trade Secret
4. Public Availability
5. Whistleblower Protections
6. Statute of Limitations
Key Legal Precedents in Corporate Espionage Cases
- United States v. Hsu (1999): Established that attempted corporate espionage is prosecutable, even if no actual trade secrets were obtained.
- United States v. Chung (2011): Clarified that the government must prove the defendant knew the information was a trade secret, not just confidential.
- United States v. Aleynikov (2012): Found that software source code did not qualify as a trade secret under the Economic Espionage Act (later overturned).
- United States v. Nosal (2016): Ruled that the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act applies to theft of trade secrets by former employees.
- Challenging the evidence:
- Scrutinize how the evidence against you was obtained and push to suppress any improperly gathered information.
- Negotiating with prosecutors
- Presenting alternative explanations:
- Demonstrating lack of economic benefit
- Highlighting inadequate security measures
- Leveraging expert witnesses
- Pursuing civil resolutions
