AI and Trade Secret Protection Checklist

Download the AI and Trade Secret Protection Checklist (PDF, 10 pages)

Reasonable measures and precautions are essential to protecting confidential intellectual property. For trade secrets, they also bear directly on whether the law protects the information as a secret. As AI changes how information is accessed, processed, and shared, organizations need to reassess whether their existing protections remain adequate.

This checklist provides 50 practical measures organized into four priority groups: essential foundations; high priority operating controls; supporting safeguards and oversight; and specialized and situational safeguards. It addresses access controls, AI agents, vendor agreements, confidential inputs, incident response, model extraction, and reverse engineering.

Use the checklist to identify gaps, assign responsibility, and document the protections put into practice. The priority groups offer a starting point for review. The measures appropriate for an organization will depend on the information it holds, how that information is used, and the risks it faces.

Related reading: AI and the Reconfiguration of Trade Secret Litigation