§1831 — Title 18 Crimes and Criminal Procedure | U.S. Code

Summary

It makes a crime to steal or misuse a company's secret information when a person knows or intends that a foreign government, foreign instrumentality, or foreign agent will benefit. That covers taking or copying a trade secret, getting it by fraud, owning or buying it knowing it was stolen, trying to do any of those things, or planning with others to do them. A company that does this can be fined up to the larger of $10,000,000 or 3 times the value of the stolen trade secret to the company, including research and design costs and other expenses the company avoided by getting the secret.

Title 18, §1831

Crimes and Criminal Procedure — Source: USLM XML via OLRC

(a)Whoever, intending or knowing that the offense will benefit any foreign government, foreign instrumentality, or foreign agent, knowingly—

(1)steals, or without authorization appropriates, takes, carries away, or conceals, or by fraud, artifice, or deception obtains a trade secret;

(2)without authorization copies, duplicates, sketches, draws, photographs, downloads, uploads, alters, destroys, photocopies, replicates, transmits, delivers, sends, mails, communicates, or conveys a trade secret;

(3)receives, buys, or possesses a trade secret, knowing the same to have been stolen or appropriated, obtained, or converted without authorization;

(4)attempts to commit any offense described in any of paragraphs (1) through (3); or

(5)conspires with one or more other persons to commit any offense described in any of paragraphs (1) through (3), and one or more of such persons do any act to effect the object of the conspiracy,

(b)Any organization that commits any offense described in subsection (a) shall be fined not more than the greater of $10,000,000 or 3 times the value of the stolen trade secret to the organization, including expenses for research and design and other costs of reproducing the trade secret that the organization has thereby avoided.

Notes & Related Subsidiaries

Editorial Notes

Amendments

2013—Subsec. (a). Pub. L. 112–269, § 2(a), substituted “not more than $5,000,000” for “not more than $500,000” in concluding provisions. Subsec. (b). Pub. L. 112–269, § 2(b), substituted “not more than the greater of $10,000,000 or 3 times the value of the stolen trade secret to the organization, including expenses for research and design and other costs of reproducing the trade secret that the organization has thereby avoided” for “not more than $10,000,000”.

§1831 Economic Espionage

Summary

Title 18, §1831

Notes & Related Subsidiaries

Editorial Notes

Amendments

Citations & Metadata