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United Kingdom
United Kingdom
Key definition
Trade Secret definition What does Trade Secret mean? In legal practice, a trade secret is commercially valuable confidential information that a business keeps secret and protects against unauthorised acquisition, use or disclosure. In the UK, the concept is defined in the Trade Secrets (Enforcement, etc.) Regulations 2018; in Ireland it is defined in the European Union (Protection of Trade Secrets) Regulations 2018, both implementing Directive (EU) 2016/943. Information is a trade secret if it is: (i) secret in the sense of not generally known or readily accessible to people within the circles that normally deal with that kind of information; (ii) has commercial value because it is secret;...
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UK trade secrets and confidential information: definition, enforcement and remedies under the 2018 Regulations and common law breach of confidence, covering employment, reverse engineering, secondary liability and confidentiality in litigation
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Practice notes
This Practice Note sets out how trade secrets and Confidential information are protected in a commercial context, particularly where technical material is concerned. It outlines the Trade Secrets (Enforcement, etc) Regulations 2018 (Trade Secrets Regulations), SI 2018/597, and their interaction with the common law action for breach of confidence.
This Practice Note also addresses:
- how breach of confidence intersects with infringement of intellectual property rights and other causes of action
- the meanings of ‘confidential information’, ‘trade secrets’ and ‘know‑how’, and how these concepts are handled in commercial practice
- case law on secondary liability, common design and knowledge of breach, together with the position on subconscious use, derivative use and reverse engineering
- remedies available for breach of confidence, including injunctions, springboard injunctions, damages, account of profits, delivery up and destruction
Introduction to the laws protecting confidential information and trade secrets in the UK
Historically, the UK had no statutory regime for safeguarding trade secrets or other technical confidential information; protection stemmed from equitable common law principles. In 2016, the EU adopted Directive (EU) 2016/943...
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Web page updated on 22/05/2026
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