18 U.S.C. § 1839
Section 1839 · Definitions
Amended 2 times on record
Applied in 90 court decisions — leading case United States v. Wen Chyu Liu (2013)
Most recently applied in Sysco Machinery Corporation v. DCS USA Corporation (July 2025)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
As used in this chapter—
the term “foreign instrumentality” means any agency, bureau, ministry, component, institution, association, or any legal, commercial, or business organization, corporation, firm, or entity that is substantially owned, controlled, sponsored, commanded, managed, or dominated by a foreign government;
the term “foreign agent” means any officer, employee, proxy, servant, delegate, or representative of a foreign government;
the term “trade secret” means all forms and types of financial, business, scientific, technical, economic, or engineering information, including patterns, plans, compilations, program devices, formulas, designs, prototypes, methods, techniques, processes, procedures, programs, or codes, whether tangible or intangible, and whether or how stored, compiled, or memorialized physically, electronically, graphically, photographically, or in writing if—
the owner thereof has taken reasonable measures to keep such information secret; and
the information derives independent economic value, actual or potential, from not being generally known to, and not being readily ascertainable through proper means by, another person who can obtain economic value from the disclosure or use of the information;
the term “owner”, with respect to a trade secret, means the person or entity in whom or in which rightful legal or equitable title to, or license in, the trade secret is reposed;
the term “misappropriation” means—
acquisition of a trade secret of another by a person who knows or has reason to know that the trade secret was acquired by improper means; or
disclosure or use of a trade secret of another without express or implied consent by a person who—
used improper means to acquire knowledge of the trade secret;
at the time of disclosure or use, knew or had reason to know that the knowledge of the trade secret was—
derived from or through a person who had used improper means to acquire the trade secret;
acquired under circumstances giving rise to a duty to maintain the secrecy of the trade secret or limit the use of the trade secret; or
derived from or through a person who owed a duty to the person seeking relief to maintain the secrecy of the trade secret or limit the use of the trade secret; or
before a material change of the position of the person, knew or had reason to know that—
the trade secret was a trade secret; and
knowledge of the trade secret had been acquired by accident or mistake;
the term “improper means”—
includes theft, bribery, misrepresentation, breach or inducement of a breach of a duty to maintain secrecy, or espionage through electronic or other means; and
does not include reverse engineering, independent derivation, or any other lawful means of acquisition; and
the term “Trademark Act of 1946” means the Act entitled “An Act to provide for the registration and protection of trademarks used in commerce, to carry out the provisions of certain international conventions, and for other purposes 1, approved July 5, 1946 (15 U.S.C. 1051 et seq.) (commonly referred to as the ‘Trademark Act of 1946’ or the ‘Lanham Act’)” 1.
1 So in original. The closing quotation marks probably should follow “purposes” instead of “ ‘Lanham Act’)”.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
References in Text
The Trademark Act of 1946, referred to in par. (7), is act July 5, 1946, ch. 540, 60 Stat. 427, also popularly known as the Lanham Act, which is classified generally to chapter 22 (§ 1051 et seq.) of Title 15, Commerce and Trade. For complete classification of this Act to the Code, see Short Title note set out under section 1051 of Title 15 and Tables.
Amendments
2016—Par. (3)(B). Pub. L. 114–153, § 2(b)(1)(A), substituted “another person who can obtain economic value from the disclosure or use of the information” for “the public”.
Pars. (5) to (7). Pub. L. 114–153, § 2(b)(1)(B)–(3), added pars. (5) to (7).
Effective Date of 2016 Amendment
Amendment by Pub. L. 114–153 applicable with respect to any misappropriation of a trade secret (as defined in this section) for which any act occurs on or after May 11, 2016, see section 2(e) of Pub. L. 114–153, set out as a note under section 1833 of this title.