APEC Leaders Agree to Not Impose Duties on Electronic Data, Adopt Best Practices to Deter Trade Secrets Theft
Members of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) group agreed to refrain from imposing customs duties on electronically transmitted content, committed to not competitively devalue currencies, and adopted a set of best practices to protect trade secrets, according to a White…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
House fact sheet (here) recapping the Nov. 18-20 APEC summit in Lima. The best-practices document (here) suggests that APEC members apply broad standing to claims for the protection of trade secrets and enforcement against their theft; outlines standards for remedies, penalties, and civil and criminal liability for trade secrets theft; and recommends adoption of “written measures” to better protect against further disclosure when governments require submission of trade secrets. “The progress achieved today at APEC is an important step in the right direction,” U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a Nov. 21 statement (here). “We look forward to working with countries in the Asia-Pacific to raise standards for trade secret protection and enforcement, including the adoption of these best practices.”