The U.S. House of Representatives yesterday passed the Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2015, which creates a single U.S. standard for protecting companies from intellectual property theft through civil recourse, including injunctions and damages against the offending parties in federal court.
The bipartisan bill, which arose in part out of concern over the growing threat of digital IP theft, already passed unanimously in the Senate earlier this month, setting the stage for President Barack Obama to sign it into law.
“Enacting this bill into law will help address the critical problem of trade secret theft, which stifles innovation and costs American companies billions of dollars annually,” said Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who co-authored the bill with Chris Coons (D-Del.), in a press statement. “I hope our success in acting to protect trade secrets will serve as a springboard for additional Congressional action to safeguard other forms of intellectual property.”
