Where is the boundary between talent mobility and the protection of trade secrets? Recently, the Chaoyang District Market Supervision Bureau of Beijing made a formal ruling on the city's first administrative penalty case involving trade secrets in the AIGC field. It imposed a fine of 100,000 yuan on the involved party for privately copying and using the AI software of their former employer. The handling of this case has drawn a clear red line for the compliant development of new digital economy models in China.
According to the information, the rights holder company is a key enterprise in the industry focusing on foreign language dubbing and AI multilingual film translation services for short videos. To support its core business, the company independently developed an internal AIGC commercial software. This software can significantly shorten the translation cycle and greatly increase production capacity, forming a crucial part of the company's core competitiveness. It is a protected confidential intangible asset. However, a core employee copied and cracked the accompanying database during employment. After leaving, the employee founded a new company and used the system to undertake competitive business for commercial gain.
Faced with the industry challenges of the high concealment, technical difficulty, and easy loss of evidence in the AIGC field, law enforcement officers used advanced electronic data evidence collection techniques. First, they comprehensively fixed the data on the involved computers and servers to prevent key evidence from being altered or deleted. Then, through in-depth cross-comparison of software installation traces, database access logs, and project output files, the officers fully reconstructed the defendant's copying and cracking behavior during employment, as well as the process of reusing the software in the new company. Through these technical means, the law enforcement department successfully established a complete chain of evidence showing "copying - cracking - reuse across companies - continuous profit."
Based on the relevant provisions of Article 26 of the People's Republic of China Anti-Unfair Competition Law, the market supervision department imposed a fine of 100,000 yuan on the involved party and simultaneously assisted the company in strengthening confidentiality systems such as permission grading, log tracing, and off-boarding audits, helping to completely eliminate daily management loopholes.
As the first administrative penalty case involving trade secrets in the AIGC field in Beijing, this case has profound practical significance. It not only clearly defines for the first time in the administrative enforcement level that AIGC commercial software can be protected by law as trade secrets, but also proves with facts that the market supervision department is fully capable of dealing with complex evidence collection issues in this field. This case sends a clear signal to the workforce: talents can freely move, but they must never use the digital assets of their former employers as a platform for entrepreneurship and profit. It provides a highly referenceable law enforcement model for similar cases nationwide.
