Tagged: EEA

AIA Technical Corrections Bill and Trade Secret Penalties Bill Await President’s Signature

As most Americans focused on the Congressional efforts to avoid the “fiscal cliff,” IP practitioners noted that Congress passed Senate-amended versions of a bill to amend the Smith-Leahy America Invents Act (AIA) (H.R. 6621) and a bill to increase penalties under the Economic Espionage Act (EEA)(H.R. 6029) on to the White House on January 1, 2013, for signature by President Obama. It is expected that President Obama will sign both bills into law shortly.

U.S. v. Aleynikov Redux: Senate Closes Loophole in EEA

This past spring, we reported the Second Circuit’s reversal in U.S. v. Aleynikov, where the Court considered violations of the Economic Espionage Act of 1996 (“EEA”), 18 U.S.C. § 1832, and the National Stolen Property Act (“NSPA”), 18 U.S.C. § 2314. In short, the Second Circuit ruled that the EEA pertains to trade secrets “placed in” commerce, and that Aleynikov’s alleged misappropriation of the source code of Goldman Sachs & Co.’s trading system, which was for internal use, therefore was not violative of the EEA or the NSPA.