From The Australian, home country paper for the Rio Tinto executives who were convicted of stealing trade secrets in China, a story concerning China providing, apparently for the first time, a definition of what a trade secret actually is.
The Chinese state-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission issued what the paper said were “wide-ranging and vague” definitions that “may have done little to clarify matters.”
According to The Australian:
In its 34-clause notice, the commission said secrets range from financial information to strategic plans, from technology to mergers, procurement to restructuring - virtually anything that hasn't been publicly disclosed and could hold economic value to the company.
And, according to the story, “under the newly published rules, details of negotiations involving government-owned companies – such as iron-ore pricing talks – are considered commercial secrets.
Some American state laws about trade secrets are a little vague, we'll grant you, but vagueness and criminal convictions simply don't go together in our common law tradition.
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