Intellectual Property Law

Strip photo galleries in legal battle over trade secrets

Posted on August 30, 2009
By Steve Green High-end photography companies with galleries at Las Vegas casino-resorts may be headed for a legal showdown, with one accusing the other of misappropriating its trade secrets. Peter Lik USA says it has galleries in Las Vegas at the Forum Shops at Caesars, the Venetian and Mandalay Place; and elsewhere around the country and in Peter Lik's native Australia...

Ad agency sued over Bing commercials

Posted on August 29, 2009
By: Nick Eaton: Microsoft reporter Seattle Pi Blogs The advertising agency Microsoft hired to promote Bing has been sued for patent infringement over a commercial for the search engine during NBC's "The Philanthropist," according to Advertising Age. Denizen, a small ad company registered in Delaware, claims an advertising concept in which a commercial serves to advance the plot of the TV show during which it runs...

Report: Man stole trade secrets

Posted on August 29, 2009
By:Robert Napper and Beth Burger Bradenton Herald Manatee County Sheriff's Office detectives arrested Darrin Stephen Zaza, 44, after viewing surveillance video of him entering a conference room in a local Comfort Suite motel, where his former boss was planning to hold the event...

Was Twitter Document Theft and Publication by TechCrunch Legal?

Posted on August 26, 2009
By Jeffrey D. Neuburger Unauthorized access to corporate information in general (regardless of the manner in which the items were obtained) may constitute trade secret misappropriation. Most states have enacted some version of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act (UTSA), which defines the term very broadly to include not only a secret process or formula but also any other "information" that has economic value as a result of being kept secret...

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Language Line sues over trade secrets

Posted on August 25, 2009
Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal: Language Line Services Inc. and Tele-Interpreters LLC said they filed suit against Voiance Language Services LLC, alleging infringement of trade secrets. Monterey-based Language Line said Voiance, which is based in Tucson, Ariz...

GATA Presses Fed to give Up Its Golden Secrets

Posted on August 24, 2009
By: Chris Powell, Secretary/Treasurer, GATA Yesterday GATA's Washington-area law firm filed with the Federal Reserve Board an administrative appeal of the Fed's most recent refusal to grant us access to the agency's records involving the U.S. gold reserve...

Trade secrets: the iron ore wars

Posted on August 22, 2009
By: John Garnaut, Beijing Three weeks ago, global strategy chief Doug Ritchie checked into Shanghai's downtown Four Seasons hotel to find the entire floor had been cleared of other guests. His only companion was Ian Bauert, Rio's global head of iron ore marketing, who had arrived before him...

Chinese spy who stole B-1 bomber, space shuttle secrets is convicted

Posted on August 21, 2009
VANCOUVERITE SANTA ANA, CA-- The full extent of China's economic and military espionage in the U.S. has come to light following the conviction of a former Rockwell and Boeing engineer from Orange County. In his ruling read  in court,  Carney found Chung guilty of conspiracy to commit economic espionage, six counts of economic espionage to benefit a foreign country, one count of acting as an agent of the People's Republic of China and one count of making false statements to the FBI...

Trade secrets stolen, 2 arrested

Posted on August 21, 2009
Reported by: WPTV staff BOCA RATON, FL- Boca Raton Police have arrested two men on suspicion of stealing trade secrets from the company they worked for. The company alleged that its chief operating officer, Christian Matteis, and Leonard Tambasco, the executive flight director, had stolen office furniture and equipment, client lists and client information, and tampered with computer files...

Trade secrets - not so secret!

Posted on August 19, 2009
By Alicia DeLeon Torres I'm on the Los Angeles to San Diego Amtrak afternoon commuter train. The guy across from me is looking at his laptop screen. As he scrolls through his documents, I easily see the pretty graphics, staff assignments and other information I'm sure that I - and others on the train - are not meant to see...

Ranch-style homes have rich history in Lincoln

Posted on August 17, 2009
By LINDA ULRICH Lincoln Journal Star When the Homebuilders Association of Lincoln began in the early 1950s, the Petersons and other builders built an early model ranch, called a "trade secrets" home, in conjunction with the National Association of Homebuilders...

China imposes moratorium on "chaotic" steel industry

Posted on August 16, 2009
By Proactive Investors China China has long been tackling the steel industry's overcapacity, but has now called the industry "chaotic" and linked the issue to the recent Rio scandal, in which four employees of the mining giant have been charged for trade secrets infringement and bribery...

Fog hangs over tourism spending

Posted on August 16, 2009
By Denise Jewell Gee NEWS NIAGARA REPORTER The Niagara Tourism and Convention Corp. has been selective in what it has chosen to disclose to the City of Niagara Falls so that some records don't end up in the hands of the public. That information it has withheld includes: ? Salaries of its employees, aside from its president...

Reading Word: The dark side of IP

Posted on August 14, 2009
By:Sigrid Caroline Schroder DC Business Strategies Examiner US sales of Microsoft Word are banned as of October. Most businesses think of IP from the light side: protecting their inventions, innovations, creations and "aha moments" from the onslaught of competition...

Prosecutors nod Rio Tinto employees' arrest over trade secrets infringement, bribery

Posted on August 11, 2009
Chinaview Editor: Yan Prosecutors have approved the arrest of four employees of the Anglo-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto Ltd. on charges of trade secrets infringement and bribery, according to a statement of China's Supreme People's Procuratorate late Tuesday...

AISD trustees to decide whether to move forward with lawsuit

Posted on August 10, 2009
By American-Statesman Staff Austin trustees are scheduled to decide Monday whether to move forward with a lawsuit to keep documents related to their search for a new superintendent from being released to the public. The lawsuit was filed in June without board approval because, according to the school district's attorneys, the district had to meet a deadline for filing a suit challenging Attorney General Greg Abbott office's ruling that certain documents from the search be made public...

RHJ Will Sweeten Bid For GM's European Unit

Posted on August 08, 2009
By DANA CIMILLUCA Belgian investment firm RHJ International plans to sweeten its bid for General Motors Co.'s European unit in an effort to overcome German government opposition to its bid. A deal with Magna and Sberbank poses risks for GM that a deal with RHJ would not...

Health care board talks should be more open

Posted on August 07, 2009
By: Patterson Irrigator Editorial Board The Del Puerto Health Care District board of directors voted unanimously to extend the district's purchase agreement with Keystone for a new health center. There was no public discussion on the matter. "The acts of attempting to amend zoning laws or choose a different parcel of property to acquire don't come remotely close to falling within the definition set forth in the civil code," Ewert wrote in an e-mail to the Irrigator...

Local company counter-sues printer giant

Posted on August 06, 2009
By: Ryan Carter Hacienda Heights-based Green Project Inc. alleges in a lawsuit filed July 27 in U.S. District Court in Oregon that Epson America Inc. and its parent, Japan-based Seiko Epson Corp., sent a company spy into the facility to gain access to trade secrets...

Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Rules on a Trade Secret Matter

Posted on August 06, 2009
By: Keith Clouse The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals recently vacated summary judgment in a trade secret case. Cudd Pressure Control Inc. v. Roles, No. 08-20389 (5th Cir. June 11, 2009), Ronnie Roles worked for Cudd Pressure Control Inc. until he (and several other former Cudd employees) joined a newly-formed competing business...

IBM can't try again to keep ex-M&A chief from Dell

Posted on August 02, 2009
By Erik Larson U.S. District Judge Stephen Robinson in White Plains, New York, rejected IBM's claim this week that it had new evidence to include in a motion for a preliminary injunction against the ex-employee, David L. Johnson. Robinson denied IBM's first request June 26, saying it would unfairly hurt Johnson's career...

Brokerages Not Worried About Rise in Code Theft Allegations

Posted on July 31, 2009
By: James Ramage Conviction aside, recent high profile allegations of code copying at Goldman Sachs and UBS have the industry's attention. But electronic trading execs say that even though proprietary technology security is a priority, the risk of employees copying trade secret coding to use elsewhere isn't a major concern...

Telecoms balk at broadband mapping requirements

Posted on July 30, 2009
By: Kenneth Corbin It would seem that the push and pull between government officials trying to get sound data about broadband deployment and the providers who aren't too eager to divulge their trade secrets continues. Dow Jones is reporting that leading industry associations, including US Telecom, NCTA and CTIA are appealing to the director of the National Telecommunications Information Administration to relax the level of detail the agency is requesting from the providers...

Vocational training hopes to turn farmers into artisans

Posted on July 27, 2009
t's true to say that some artisans try to keep certain trade secrets. Lai Phu Ban, an artisan in Buoi Village in Tay Ho District, Ha Noi, is an example. He masters a unique technique for making sac phong paper, which is made from a special type of paper, called sac, and in the past this paper was used exclusively by kings and the royal court...

Juvie 'trade secrets' suit alive

Posted on July 25, 2009
By Jennifer Learn-Andes jandes@timesleader.com Recent letter from lawyer for owner Greg Zappala critical of state auditors. A controversial 2004 Pittston Township detention center "trade secrets" lawsuit against former Luzerne County controller Steve Flood and two state welfare officials is still alive...

Peter Jackson and Hayao Miyazaki Hit Comic-Con

Posted on July 25, 2009
By MICHAEL CIEPLY SAN DIEGO -- Few directors are as revered by the fervent fans who attend Comic-Con as Peter Jackson, and he showed up before a rapturous crowd of 6,500 Friday afternoon with a plea. Mr. Jackson, the New Zealander who is lord of the "Rings" trilogy and all things fantasy and horror, was on hand to promote a science fiction thriller directed by a protégé, Neill Blomkamp...

O'Brien: Corporate secrecy under the microscope after Twitter leaks

Posted on July 22, 2009
By Chris O'Brien The publication of internal documents about Twitter that were filched by a hacker caused fans across Silicon Valley to express their outrage. For all the controversy, my own gut reaction after reading the notes and financial projections: "Is that it?" These were the great trade secrets that the valley fretted could undermine Twitter's future and send it plunging off a cliff? Hardly...

A.R.M.S. Inc. Wins Trade Secret and Breach of Fiduciary Duty Lawsuit against Stephen P. Troy, Jr. and Troy Industries, Inc

Posted on July 21, 2009
By: Scott & Bush Ltd. WEST BRIDGEWATER, Mass. - (Business Wire) Atlantic Research Marketing Systems (A.R.M.S.®) Inc., with more than 40 National Stock Numbers [NSN's] in service to the U.S., and foreign militaries worldwide, specializes in advancing the capabilities of small arms, crew served, and anti-armor weapons in function, reliability and accuracy...

China dismisses links to engineer convicted in US of economic espionage

Posted on July 21, 2009
By: Associated Press BEIJING (AP) -- China on Tuesday denied links to a Chinese-born engineer who was convicted in the U.S. last week of stealing trade secrets for China during his 30-year career at Boeing and Rockwell International. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a brief statement the charges against former Boeing Co...

Ex-Boeing Engineer Guilty Of Stealing Trade Secrets For China

Posted on July 19, 2009
By: Kathy Shwiff DOW JONES NEWSWIRES A former engineer at Rockwell International and Boeing Co. (BA) was convicted Thursday of economic espionage - the first such conviction under a 1996 law - and acting as an agent of the People's Republic of China...

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