Microsoft Promotes New Trade Secrets Bill (thestack.com) 28
An anonymous reader writes: A Microsoft lawyer has put forward the company's conviction that the Defend Trade Secrets Act 2015, currently being debated at the United States Senate Judiciary Committee, is necessary to protect digital businesses which are now hamstrung by having to pursue trade secret infractions — a federal crime — within state law. Though the bill, revised from its failed 2014 submission, contains necessary updates for the inevitable shortcomings of existing 1979/1985 legislation regarding trade secrets, its opponents are more interested in the way it would extend ex parte seizure law to federalize private information and data in corporate plaintiffs' lawsuits and extend the possibility for closed hearings and media injunctions.
It is usually not the main focus of the bill... (Score:4, Informative)
In Engrish, please. (Score:3)
>> it would extend ex parte seizure law to federalize private information
In Engrish, please.
Re: (Score:2)
the "victim" can force the "offender" to submit data (private information) to the benevolent govt agency of choice.
well at least that is what i think it means but i am probably wrong.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
"Ex parte" orders are orders by a judge without the party present. "Ex parte seizure" is a step between cops stealing whatever you've got without warrant, due process, or much oversight at all (aka Civil Forfeiture) and being found guilty of a crime and having punishment handed down to you. At least in this case a judge has been convinced that it's necessary to seize whatever item without you having a chance to defend yourself so some sort of warrant and/or oversight is present.
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The idea is to seize the computers sending the illegally-obtained data before it gets out. This touches on several parts of the First Amendment. Speech for one, as long as you aren't the one who stole the info, the government can't shut you up.
The other is the lesser-used part about freedom of the press, which is less about a 1940s high pants quick talker with a "Press" card tucked in his hat band and more about actual printing presses -- the mechanical means of mass production of speech for distribution,
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Wait it isn't even illegally-obtained info, my bad. This is even worse.
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I like the gag order provision (Score:5, Insightful)
Under this bill, businesses (Microsoft) could prevent release of security holes, and possible remediation. This has already happened a few times, (Adobe?) but it would put the power of the Federal Gov't behind gagging security researchers.
Also, reverse engineer a file format? Gag order coming your way. Libre Office will wither, because the compatible formats will be changed, and reverse engineering will be prevented under "Trade Secrets".
So I totally understand why Microsoft is trying to write a bill for themselves.
Re:I like the gag order provision (Score:5, Interesting)
The best part is that Microsoft is whining about their privacy and intellectual property immediately after they released an operating system that is designed to spy on users and steal their intellectual property.
A Politician gets a Clue (Score:3)
from the /. title and summary:
from the opening sentence of Marco Rubio's guest column [hotair.com] warning against government-funded corporate bailouts and appearing today at HotAir.com [hotair.com]:
So, more rigging underway here.
Trade secrets protected by law (Score:1)
Perchance would these be called patents? No? Then why is the government involved?
This is why we need simple language (Score:3)
We need simple language legislation now. You shouldn't have to be a lawyer or need one to read a law and understand how you're fucked over by it.
Booooooogus (Score:1)
This seems like uSoft trying to have their cake and eat it to.
A company can get legal idea protection from the public in exchange for disclosure through a patent .
That is in theory a good bargain for both parties.
Trolls make practice another matter.
This bill seems to be about a company getting the protection without the disclosure and time limit.
This is contrary to history. Coke chose to keep their formula secret.
This got away from the time limit, but has always risked somebody figuring it out.
Some have co
MOD PARENT UP (Score:4, Interesting)
This seems like uSoft trying to have their cake and eat it to.
THIS.
Trade secrets, once disclosed, are no longer secret. If your idea does not merit patent protection, then use a trade secret as long as it holds -- but no longer. If your idea merits patent protection patent it -- *and disclose it*, in exchange for federal protection *for a limited time*.
Do *NOT* under any circumstances, make legal changes to allow trade secrets to become the moral equivalent of a patent in perpetuity.
Already passed in Australia (Score:5, Interesting)
It's another example of legislation framed in Australia and then exported to America. After editing the proposed act for compatibility with the American constitution it then becomes a Bill proposed to congress.
Don't let it pass. It has some really nasty provisions against using encryption by classing it as a 'controlled munition'. If it follows the Australian model then you will find that it has some pretty unpleasant provisions that grants the government the capacity to appropriate any software you may have written and then make you criminally liable for using the software you created. I tried, but not enough people here care or understand.
Whilst it is an unpopular to talk about IT unions here, this is one of the things they are tasked to be on the look out for. Frankly, I'd prefer to pay mandatory fees and have someone else do this so I could get on with the things I do best. I can't stand reading these legislations to see what the next thing is that government is going to use to fuck over IT professionals and the amount of time I spend writing letters to politicians, when they propose these bills, has become really intense over the last 18 months. Excluding the TPP, which is double the size I estimated (6000 pages), this is the 5th Act passed that affects Information Technology.
This has nothing to do with left or right politics. It has everything to do with a functioning democracy. It is naive to think that raw talent and intelligence is enough to succeed in this industry anymore, the game is much bigger. If you don't like the idea of an I.T union then start picking up legislation and using your big brain to analyze the effect it is going to have on you and your peers and start writing letters to politicians because the bottom line here is no one has got our back and these laws will continue to be framed to control what you think you can do by criminalizing your behavior when appropriate.
It's not a slippery slope any more, it's a full on uncontrolled slide.
Re: (Score:2)
Encryption was considered a munition in America too, once, if it had greater than 40 bit keys.
Are you certain that wasn't for export restrictions as opposed to use inside your country?
This lasted until PGP came about and deliberately released the source code in printed format, so anyone could type or scan it in. It became a constitutional challenge, and the courts determined that code is protected by the First Amendment. So no, encryption can't be classified as a controlled munition in America.
I hope you are right and as I said After editing the proposed act for compatibility with the American constitution it then becomes a Bill proposed to congress. However I think you will find that Bernstein was brought in 1995 and again in 1999, so you will have to assess how the wartime provisions, that allowed the passage of the homeland security act, affects your constitutional access to the objects created. i.e. the
Good segue (Score:1)
This fits right in the the previous 'political corruption' story. Oh well, I guess everything is going to be locked down soon.
A Microsoft lawyer .. (Score:2)
Remember 'Bings innovative search algo'? (Score:1)
This is surely a joke:
‘[Behind] Cortana sits a vast amount of technology developed or enhanced in-house by Microsoft – voice recognition; language translation; reactive and predictive algorithms that can synthesize context, location and data, and interface with the vast resources of the Bing search engine index; and a complex array of cloud servers to crunch and serve data in real time. This technology represents tens of thousands of hours of research, trial and error, and continued improvement