Does Memorizing a List Equal Stealing Trade Secrets?

It does in Ohio and it might in Indiana. The Ohio Supreme Court interpreted its version of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act to include a memorized list of business' clients. Since Indiana trade secrets law is the Uniform Trade Secrets Act, this case has possible application here.

The Daily Report published Ohio high court rules that trade secrets need not be in writing about this case.

O'Donnel's ruling noted that employees who leave their jobs inevitably have casual memories of contacts and things that occurred during their employment, but that information is not protected.

"This is a very narrow legal issue," said Martin's attorney, Samuel Lillard, who had argued that Martin did nothing wrong by contacting clients.

"He had a history with those individuals," Lillard said.

Columbus attorney Barry Waller, who represented Minor & Associates, said the ruling reflects a reasonable protection for businesses."The analogy I used was that somebody can't memorize the formula for Coca-Cola and then go manufacture Coca-Cola," Waller said. "A customer list is no different."

The Columbus Business First provides a link to the Ohio Supreme Court opinion in Supreme Court rules in favor of employer in trade secret case.

I/P Updates has a longer post, Former Employee's Use of Client Information from Memory Violates Uniform Trade Secrets Act, than I do detailing the reasoning of the court.

All of this leaves me with the question: how do we protect from employees memorizing employer's trade secrets? I do not see any way to protect employers than making sure they litigate aggressively enough to deter memorizing by clients.

2/15/08 update: See Trade Secrets: More on Memorizing Trade Secrets