🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <86244d$8s0$1@rrw1000.sel.cam.ac.uk>, Richard Watts wrote:
>In article <03Og4.76$5A4.687@burlma1-snr2>,
>Barry Margolin  <barmar@bbnplanet.com> wrote:
>>In article <qhya9opagf.fsf@ruckus.brouhaha.com>,
>>Eric Smith  <eric-no-spam-for-me@brouhaha.com> wrote:
>[snip]
>>>If the individual worked for the Coca Cola corporation, and was "given"
>>>the formula for Coca Cola as a necessary part of his or her job, that
>>>wouldn't give the employee any rights to the formula nor reduce the
>>>formula's standing as a trade secret.
>>
>>But in that case, the employee was presumably under an NDA, which is
>>considered sufficient to protect its secrecy.  If he were to disclose the
>>formula to a third party not under NDA, it would cease being a trade
>>secret, and the employee would presumably be liable for violating their
>>contract.
> 
>  Disclaimer: IANAL, and I'm in the UK (I believe US law is substantially
> equivalent, at least in most states, but YMMV..).
>
> The employee need not be under an NDA - confidential information is
>confidential irrespective of any specific contractual obligation, and
>an employee owes a duty of confidence to their employer even over
>and above the general duty of confidence owed by any random person. 
>Explicit agreements can't really strengthen this significantly (at
>least in the UK - the US is substantially more paranoid, and is
>I believe currently dabbling in inevitable disclosure as a way
>of restraining trade..), and in fact overly wide confidentiality
>clauses have been known to be rejected by the courts as being 
>unenforcably overgeneral.

Then giving the code to someone in such a relationship, even though it is
not augmented with an NDA, would seem to be illegal.