White Paper
Economic Espionage and
Trade Secret Theft:
Defending against the pickpockets of the new millennium
“Economic espionage is the unlawful or clandestine targeting or acquisition of sensitive financial,
trade, or economic policy information; proprietary economic information; or critical technologies.”
U.S. Attorney General’s Office
The 2002 Annual Report to Congress on Foreign Economic Espionage and Industrial Espionage
Dave Drab,
Director, Information Content Security Services
August 2003
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Table of Contents
2
Introduction
3
Is economic espionage on the rise?
4
What is the cost of economic espionage?
5
Who is involved?
5
How are trade secrets accessed?
8
What can be done to protect trade secrets?
10
Conclusion
10
Glossary of terms
Pickpockets are opportunists who work the
streets with a keen eye for a good mark. They are
masters of the art of diversion and often work in
teams, executing a series of precision tactics to
make the score. They are long gone before their
victims know what happened.
Introduction
Any organization competing today is in the business
of using its knowledge and expertise to drive new
revenue and gain advantage in the marketplace.
Maintaining the secrecy of a unique business
method, strategy, or process—a trade secret—may
be the difference between success and failure. How
well a company protects its competitive advantage is
largely dependent on its ability to identify, manage,
and protect its intellectual capital. Herein lies the
problem.
Many companies define information security
requirements on a traditional “perimeter” approach.
Companies make huge investments to secure their
physical properties and information infrastructure.
And while this approach may be effective in
preventing unauthorized persons from gaining
access from the outside, it does little to prevent the
theft or loss of critical inf