Introduction
Many companies often hide their trade secret with the aim of achieving an economic advantage over its competitors. The secret may comprise of industrial or manufacturing secret as well as commercial secret. The use of the trade secret by an unauthorized party is considered a violation of the trade secret, as well as, an unfair practice. The protection of trade secret may form a part of the general perception of protection depending on the legal system or usually is a case law of classified information. This paper is going to look at three scenarios in which some people may or may not have traded the company’s secret, or the company may have taken advantage of its clientele.
In this case, Dracca became aware that TrendBaby was soliciting information from Bob Shumaster, one of its employees. The realized that Trend baby was paying Shumaster to provide information and that he was using the company’s computer to relay the information to TrendBaby via email. From the evidence provided, one can say that Shumaster is guilty of his crimes. What Shumaster is accused of is Solicitation of trade secret. TrendBaby as well is a co-conspirator to the rime and is, therefore, guilty. The law of solicitation entails committing a crime with the purpose facilitating it commission or promoting it. A person who instructs, requests, or persuades another person to take on a certain conduct is deemed as a conspirator to its commission. In this law, it is immaterial if the actor does not communicate with his partner (Miller, & Hollowell 2011). Therefore, Shumaster is guilty of trading company secrets under the ministrations of TrendBaby while TrendBaby is guilty of encouraging, facilitating and requesting Shumaster to do the crime. In this case, both parties are conspirators. More so, these two parties were communicating and; therefore, the emails Dracca encountered will be used as evidence against them. According to the law, TrendBaby has no responsibility to Shumaster; Unless Shumaster was blackmailed to associate in the crime. If Shumaster committed the crime willingly, then, he has no one to blame but himself.
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act was passed in1986, and is a law against intentional access to computers without or exceeding authorization, thereby obtaining information from the computer, and communicating the information to a foreign or interstate party (Miller, Cross& Jentz, 2013). If a person is found guilty of this, person is punishable under this act. Shumaster is, therefore, guilty of computer Fraud and Abuse Act, because he sent companies information via the company’s computer to a foreign party, the TrendBaby Inc.
Second Scenario: May’s Ethical View
The case between May and Dracca involves sharing of information about Dracca’s new sales promotion. May is a sale representative of Dracca, and she may have shared company’s newest project to a competitor who happens to be her trusted neighbor. What this scenario seeks to find is, if it is ethical for May to have a conversation about Dracca to her neighbor. In the case of May, she did not apply competitive intelligence with the neighbor. Competitive intelligence (CI) is moral and legal collection, analysis and distribution of information concerning competition and the vulnerability, intentions and the capabilities of a business competition (Hitt, Ireland, & Hoskisson, 2013). The conversation between
May and her neighbor may look, but if the neighbor is aggressive enough, the competitor company is going to use the information shared against Mays’s company. Talking to a neighbor about information that can be readily accessed over the internet or in a document is allowed. In May’s scenario, the information she shared is not available and; therefore, she is liable to any action Dracca will deem fit. Dracca’s completion may use the information provided by May without consequence because they do not violate any law of competitive intelligence. In order for May, to avoid such blunders I future she should consider factors such as interest, the motivation and the talents, of the listeners, as well as the products, marketing strategy, personnel and the corporate strategy of the listener’s company (Hitt, Ireland, & Hoskisson, 2013).
Third Scenario: Dracca Vs Consumers
In this scenario, the Dracca’s clientele want to sue Dracca false advertising. In which they advertised cribs that would indeed add two sleeping hours for babies. It is also accused of secondary rate discrimination for varied pricing when they sold cribs at a cheaper price to their best retail customers. More so, from the scenario Dracca is seen to be violating environmental laws of its Philadelphia plant. The ramification of this is an issue. False advertising involves the use of false statement when advertising (Miller, Cross& Jentz, 2013). Dracca advertised cribs that would provide a full night sleep for infants. They claimed that babies who used this crib would sleep two hours longer than other infants. When evaluating this case, the court would look at factors such as, if Dracca’s advertiser made a false statement about the cribs. Secondly, if the advertisement deceived and if it had the capacity to deceive a large number of the targeted consumer, if the falsehood is material. Thirdly, if the advertised material is sold in expressway commerce and lastly if the plaintiff is injured in any way by the falsely advertised product.
The Robinson-Patman Act is a national law in United States that prohibit competitive practices by producers especially in price discrimination (Rosenbloom, 2009). In the case of Dracca, they sold the cribs to its two favorite retailers at a much lower price that the other six retailers. This sale resulted in rocket profits for the two retailers than the other six. This situation violates the Robinson-Patman Act in that the Dracca discriminated price to equally suited did distributors and hence did not lower completion. The United States has set emission standards. This is requires for an amount of pollutants to be emitted in the air. When Dracca’s Philadelphia plant emitted more carbon dioxide that expected it was in direct violation of the Clean Air Act. This Act was intended to manage air pollution at a national level. In the United States, excessive production of carbon dioxide is met with negativity and regulations set by Environmental protection Agency decide on the punishment fit for such an individual. In this scenario, Dracca Plants should look into ways of reducing the emission of green house gases. This could be through carbon dioxide capture and sequestration. This involves the following steps first carbon dioxide is captured from plants. Second, the CO2 is captured, compressed and transported and lastly it is injected underground, permanently stored or is geologically sequestered (Lal, 2012).
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