Protecting information that is the exclusive property of companies

In an economic environment in which the most valuable commodity is information, companies should ensure they have taken all measures to protect it. Information is a “volatile” asset which may be very easily removed from the company patrimony, losing its character of “exclusive property” of the company. Information loss is not just the loss of an asset, but it also provides an economic advantage to competitors.

Protecting information is not just protection against theft of the support on which they are stored (paper sheets, drawings, CDs, e-mails, etc.). What needs to be protected is information content, so it cannot be used, even if it is disseminated outside the proprietary company.

This type of protection can be obtained if your company has a system for classifying information as “work secret”.

Design and implementation of such a system begins with the following steps:

1. Development of a guide for work secrets. The guide contains the criteria that an information must met in order to be classified as work service.
2. Development of a regulation for use of secret information. The regulation contains rules about access to information, its classification, declassification, periodic inspection.
3. Annex to the regulation will comprise all the implementation rules. These rules will describe the norms related to classified documents marking, filing, registration, etc.
4. Development of the register for classified information and access cards.

The main advantages of the development and implementation of the classification system are:

1. Strengthen the confidentiality clauses by doubling the protection from combining the contractual clause with the one provided by the law for work secret information;
2. Internal control within the company (in case of conflict with employees, their responsibility for the disclosure of classified information is higher). Also employees access to certain information may be limited;
3. In the event of a dispute with another person or company that uses the secret information for its own benefit, it can be demonstrated that access to that information has been illegally and damages can be claimed;
4. Within companies that participate in public procurement procedures, the confidentiality of documents submitted with the offer can be proved, so that the other companies do not have access to these documents.