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CS Professional · Intellectual Property Rights - Law and Practice · Protection of Trade Secrets

Before hiring a new engineer, Kiran Auto Components Ltd wants to reduce the risk of its trade secrets leaking through employees. Which measure is best aligned with the practice of protecting trade secrets by contract?

The best measure is including a confidentiality clause in the employment contract and limiting access to sensitive information on a need-to-know basis. These steps show reasonable efforts to keep information secret. Publication destroys secrecy, registration is unavailable, and post-employment non-competes are generally void in India.

  1. AFiling the manufacturing process details with the Registrar of Companies for record
  2. BIncluding a confidentiality clause in the employment contract and restricting access to sensitive data on a need-to-know basisCorrect
  3. CPublishing the process in an industry journal to establish prior ownership
  4. DRelying solely on a post-employment non-compete clause

Explanation

Reasonable steps to maintain secrecy, such as confidentiality clauses and need-to-know access, support protection. Publishing destroys secrecy, filing with the Registrar does not protect secrets, and a post-employment non-compete alone is likely unenforceable in India.

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