商業祕密管理與信息保護強迫症

As I was participating in a recent conference of trade secret nerds (yes, we often refer to ourselves that way), I found myself thinking about the Titanic. More specifically, about the legend of the missing binoculars. It seems that on that tragic night in 1912 the lookout was unable to find a pair of binoculars that he thought had been stowed in the crow’s nest. According to the story, they were in a locked box in the quarters of the former second officer, who had been transferred to another ship just before departure (lucky guy) and apparently took the key with him. In the immediate aftermath of the sinking, no one considered that the lack of binoculars had anything at all to do with the ship’s failure to steer clear of the iceberg. It was pitch dark, and the obvious cause was excessive speed. The official report didn’t even mention binoculars. But during the later inquest, the lookout testified about his futile search, and the“but for the binoculars” legend was born.

最近，我參加了一次商業祕密另類們（是的，我們經常這樣稱呼自己）的會議，在會上我突然想到了泰坦尼克號；更具體地說，是關於雙筒望遠鏡失蹤的傳說。在 1912 年那個悲劇發生的夜晚，瞭望員以爲雙筒望遠鏡放在瞭望臺上，但卻似乎找不到了。據說，它們被放在前二副宿舍的一個帶鎖的盒子裏，二副在出發前被調到另一艘船上（這是個幸運的傢夥），顯然他把鑰匙也帶走了。沉船事故發生後，沒有人認爲雙筒望遠鏡的缺失與泰坦尼克號未能避開冰山有任何關聯。當時的環境一片漆黑，沉船最顯著的原因顯然是船速過快。官方報告甚至沒有提到雙筒望遠鏡。但在後來的審訊中，瞭望員作證說他沒有找到，於是就有了“如果有雙筒望遠鏡結果可能不同”的說法。

Why did this come to mind sitting in a meeting about trade secret management? We were debating a classic question: should a company create a “list” of its secrets, so that it can sensibly manage them and be ready if it has to go to court to protect them? The transactional lawyers in the group said yes, but many of the litigators were opposed. They worried that if a company committed to a list, it might later need to file an action to enforce a secret that wasn’t on the list and lose the case as a result. Like the binoculars, something that initially seemed fairly insignificant might become critical in a new context.

爲什麼坐在一次關於商業祕密管理的會議上，我們會想到泰坦尼克號上的雙筒望遠鏡呢？當時我們正在討論一個經典問題：一個公司是否應該列出一份商業祕密“清單”，以便切合實際地管理這些祕密，併爲在需要訴諸法庭保護它們時做好準備？會議小組中的交易律師表示同意，但許多訴訟律師表示反對。他們擔心，如果公司過分依賴一份清單，一旦未來要針對某項商業祕密提起訴訟來維權，但該祕密卻沒有被羅列在清單上，，並且因此輸掉訴訟。就像望遠鏡一樣，最初看起來微不足道的東西，在新的情境下中可能會變得至關重要。

Proving trade secrets often requires focus on the impression that you’re giving the judge or jury about what information really matters to you. Ideally, the owner offers compelling evidence that this specific design, or code, or process makes a big difference to the success of the company. But if you had failed to put this on the “list,” it’s hard to avoid the argument that you didn’t care enough about it, or it just wasn’t all that important. However, as we’ll see it doesn’t necessarily have to end up that way; a lot depends on how you go about “listing” what you have.

證明商業祕密通常需要給法官或陪審團留下哪些信息對你是真正重要的印象。理想情況下，權利人需要提供令人信服的證據，證明特定設計、代碼或流程對公司的成功意義非凡。但是如果你沒有把這一信息列入“清單”，就很難避免對方抗辯說你沒有給予信息足夠關注，或者它並不那麼重要。然而，正如我們所看到的，事情並不一定是這樣；很大程度上取決於你如何“列舉”你所擁有的東西。

At our meeting, the argument boiled down to a contest of competing perfections. The corporate lawyers wanted to maximize the company’s ability to manage an asset that is as valuable as it is evanescent, so were willing to take some risk on a later dispute if in return the business could more effectively supervise its secrets. The litigators wanted to maximize flexibility to “adjust” the company’s claimed secrets to later circumstances, without worrying about a previous catalog that may have missed something now considered to be important.

我們在會議上的爭論，實際上成爲了一場完美主義的較量。公司律師希望最大限度地提高公司管理資產的能力，而這些資產既有價值又容易被破壞。因此，如果公司能夠更有效地監管其商業祕密，他們願意爲日後的糾紛承擔一定的風險。訴訟律師則希望最大限度地提高靈活性，以便根據以後的情況“調整”公司所主張的商業祕密，而不必擔心以前的目錄清單可能會遺漏一些當前被認爲是重要的內容。

Both sides in this debate were right and wrong. Yes, the law requires that a company trying to enforce its trade secret rights demonstrate that it has engaged in “reasonable efforts” to keep them secret; and knowing what they are is an obvious first step in that process. But the law requires only that the business act reasonably, not flawlessly. Similarly, in litigation where you have strong proof of theft, the jury is not likely to be too distracted by the fact that you didn’t perfectly categorize all the secrets that you can now prove have value.

這場辯論的雙方各有對錯。是的，法律要求試圖主張商業祕密的公司證明其已採取“合理措施”來保護商業祕密；當然，要採取保密措施首先要知道這些商業祕密是什麼。但法律只要求企業合理行事，而不是完美無缺。同樣，在商業祕密訴訟中，如果你有充分的證據證明你的商業祕密被盜竊，並且證明該祕密是有價值的，，那麼陪審團不會太在意你沒有把它明確羅列出來。。

Of course, it certainly helps to show that you have always taken seriously the need to protect the information that gives your business a competitive edge. The judge or jury tends to equate the actual value of your secrets with the relative effort that you have put into caring for them. But that doesn’t mean you have to inventory each and every bit of data. That’s a fool’s errand. Because trade secrets are so granular and pervasive throughout the enterprise, and because they – and their value – are always changing, you would have to be updating the list daily, and you would never get it totally right.

當然，證明您一貫認真保護那些爲企業帶來競爭優勢的信息對訴訟確有幫助。法官或陪審團傾向於認爲，您的商業祕密的實際價值與您爲保護它們所付出的努力是相對應的。但這並不意味着您必須將每一條數據都羅列出來，那是愚蠢的。由於商業祕密由很多微小單位構成，而且普遍存在於企業中，而且它們的範圍及其價值總是在變化之中，如果您就不得不必須每天更新清單，您將永遠無法做到完全正確。

There is a simpler way to identify your information assets, one that doesn’t take inordinate resources or risk losing a lawsuit. It recognizes that there is no one “best practice,” but only a range of practice that is “reasonable under the circumstances” for your business. As that phrase suggests, there are multiple potentially relevant factors.

有一種更簡單的方法來識別信息資產，這種方法既不需要耗費過多的資源，也不需要冒着輸掉官司的風險。這種方法的理念就是，沒有一種“最佳的做法”，只有“在特定情況下合理”的做法。何爲合理？這需要考慮多個可能相關的因素。

For example, if you run a small business that is relatively predictable, such as a restaurant or an insurance agency, you already have an appreciation for the secrets you need to protect, whether recipes or customer lists. And you know that the main risk you face is with employees who may be tempted to walk off with them. Having that in mind, your efforts will be focused on limiting access, perhaps with some training to help the workforce understand why those things are sensitive.

例如，如果你經營一家業務相對可預測的小企業，比如餐館或保險代理，那麼你已經知道哪些是需要保護的祕密，無論是食譜還是客戶名單。你知道企業面臨的主要風險是員工可能會試圖帶走這些祕密。考慮到這一點，你的工作重點將放在限制接觸權限上，或許還可以進行一些培訓，幫助員工瞭解爲什麼這些信息是保密信息。

At what might be the other extreme, if yours is a startup tech company with a mission to disrupt a market, you will be creating and discarding ideas and data as you quickly grow. Your dataset of valuable information is necessarily dynamic (as are the risks it faces). In that environment, trying to stop and get a useful handle on what your most important secrets are can be very difficult; everything is moving too fast.

另外一個完全相反的例子是，如果你的公司是一家初創科技公司，願景是要顛覆市場，那麼隨着公司快速發展，你將不斷產生新的想法和數據，然後又放棄，週而復始。因此，那些有價值的信息組合必然是動態的（所面臨的風險也是動態的）。在這種情況下，要想停下來去有效處理最重要的商業祕密，可能會非常困難；因爲一切都發展得太快了。

But that doesn’t mean you should just throw up your hands and forget about trying to understand the nature of your competitive advantage. You may not have (yet) discovered something discrete on the order of the blockbuster drug molecule or the perfect search algorithm; but even in the early stages you learn a lot about what works andwhat doesn’t. You develop an idea of what the ideal feature set for your upcoming product might be. You begin to understand what it is that your customer base would love to have, if only you could deliver it to them.

但這並不意味着就應該完全放棄去瞭解競爭優勢在哪裏。你可能還沒有發現像重磅藥物分子或完美搜索算法那樣獨特的東西；但即使在早期階段，你也會學到很多：什麼行得通、什麼行不通。你想到即將上市產品應該具有哪些特徵。你開始明白你的客戶羣最想要什麼，如果你能向客戶兌現他們的需求就好了。

Would you want your competitors to have access to all that information? Of course not. But if you don’t pause from time to time to think about what it is, then you won’t be in a position to actively manage it, to protect it and use it to increase enterprise value. Remember, the “it” we’re talking about here is the essence of what distinguishes your company, or will distinguish it going forward. What could be more important?

你希望競爭對手能夠接觸到所有上述這些信息嗎？當然不希望。你應該時不時地停下來思考這些信息究竟是什麼，否則你將無法積極地管理它、保護它並利用它來提高企業價值。請記住，我們在這裏談論的“它”，是你的公司與衆不同的本質所在，或者說，它將在未來脫穎而出。還有什麼比這更重要呢？

The point is that you don’t have to boil the ocean to know what you have at a sensible level of detail. For many companies, it will be enough to identify the categories of information that are (or will be) your “crown jewels,” recorded and briefly described on a spreadsheet that is regularly updated. Other companies wanting to impose more discipline on the process may opt to use a trade secret management tool such asTangibly. Whatever sort of system you adopt, its description or user notes should include the caveat that it is intended as a guide for management, and should not be seen as comprehensive or exhaustive. By doing that, and also describing your secrets in broad terms, you will decrease the risk that something omitted becomes a problem.

關鍵在於，您無需煞費苦心地瞭解你的商業祕密的每個細節。對於許多公司來說，只需確定重要（現在或將來像“皇冠上的寶石”一樣重要）信息的類別，並在定期更新的電子錶格中記錄和簡要描述這些類別就足夠了。其他希望對流程施加更多約束的公司可能會選擇使用Tangibly等商業祕密管理工具。無論您採用哪種系統，說明或用戶須知都應包括如下提示：系統只是管理指南，而不是全面或詳盡的管理手段。通過這樣做，並對商業祕密進行概括性描述，您將降低遺漏某些內容而引發問題的風險。

On the positive side, you will have given yourself a solid basis for effective management of your information assets by assigning appropriate risk levels and considering mitigation measures. And you will be much more prepared for transactions likeacquisitions or licenses, and also able to respond immediately with litigation when your rights are threatened.

從積極的一面來看，通過適當的風險分級並考慮相應的降低風險的措施，您將爲自己有效管理信息資產奠定堅實的基礎。而且，您將爲收購或許可等交易做好更加充分的準備，並且能夠在權利受到威脅時立即提起訴訟。

At least you won’t be frantically searching for the keys to the binoculars case.

至少，你不用瘋狂地尋找雙筒望遠鏡盒的鑰匙。

[1]由北京taptap点点体育官方网站國際業務專業委員會高級合夥人朱尉賢律師、陳哲遠律師審校。