Learning About Your Competitor Lawfully: Reverse Engineering, Benchmarking, and the Line Trade Secret Law Draws
By Casey Scott McKay ·
Every company wants to know what its competitors are doing, and most of the ways of finding out are perfectly lawful. This article draws the line trade secret law actually draws: not between knowing and not knowing, but between proper and improper means of acquisition. It works through reverse engineering and why it is protected, the sources a competitive intelligence function may and may not use, the hiring problem that generates most of the sector's litigation, contamination and what to do when it happens, and the asymmetry that makes the receiving company's records more important than the collector's intentions. It closes with the practical test that resolves most questions in an afternoon.
IP and Technology > Trade Secrets | Article | Published 4 January 2025 - Updated 24 March 2026 | Casey Scott McKay - marksy.us
The question, asked badly and asked well
A product manager asks whether the company can buy a competitor's product, take it apart, and copy what it finds. A sales director asks whether a new hire from a competitor can tell the team what that competitor charges. A strategy team asks whether it can scrape a rival's website daily to track its pricing.
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