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Author : Willh26 Licence   Creative Commons  Attribution Share Alike 4.0 International Source Wikipedia Jane Lambert A recent decision of the Court of Appeal to enforce a non-disclosure agreement ("NDA") by means of an interim injunction has led to a promise by the Prime Minister to review the law relating to such agreements (see Court stops Telegraph publishing 'sexual harassment' story   24 Oct 2018 BBC website). While NDAs,  like any legal instrument can be abused, they are a very useful business tool.   They enable inventors to discuss their inventions with potential collaborators and investors before they are ready to apply for patents.  They prevent the disclosure or use of sensitive commercial information that may have taken years to gather.  They allow business relations to continue between parties to potentially damaging disputes. Earlier this year the trade secrecy laws of the 28 member states of the Euro...

Jane Lambert On 9 June 2018 the Trade Secrets Directive  was implemented into English and Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish law by The Trade Secrets (Enforcement etc) Regulations 2018 . I discussed the directive's provisions in The Trade Secrets Directive   7 July 2016 NIPC Law and its implementation in  Transposing the Trade Secrets Directive into English Law: The Trade Secrets (Enforcement etc) Regulations   6 June 2018. I also advised that Trade Secrecy Law changes Tomorrow - check your NDA, Standard Terms and other Agreements   8 June 2018 NIPC Inventors Club. In this article I consider the checks that business owners and professional advisers should make to ensure that their contract terms comply with the new law. References to Confidentiality Agreements in the Directive The Trade Secrets Directive makes only two references to confidentiality agreements.   Art 4 (3) (b) lists "being in breach of a confidentiality agreement" as ...