Confidentiality Agreements: Lawyers Protecting Information with Non-Disclosure Contracts
All Confidentiality Agreements Protect Your Valuable Information
Confidentiality agreement lawyers help you protect your business as you grow, sell, finance or improve. If you want your ideas, products, and/or services to reach wider audiences, you have to be willing to bring people on board to help you advance your business goals. This can often mean giving new people access to documentation or information that you have spent a lot of time, energy, and resources developing and gaining.
Before you share valuable trade secrets or any proprietary information with new employees, contractors, investors, or any other partners, it is wise to ask these people to first sign a non-disclosure or confidentiality agreement. As with many areas of corporate law, the law around confidentiality agreements has been interpreted by Alberta courts many times which can add a lawyer of complication but also clarity. The confidentiality agreement lawyers at Kahane Law Office can help draft, explain and defend non-disclosure or confidentiality agreements in Calgary, Alberta.
What Are Confidentiality Agreements?
When disclosing confidential information to someone else, this individual can be asked to sign a confidentiality contract that details how this information is to be handled. There are many different terms people chose to include within a nondisclosure or confidentiality agreement in Alberta.
The following terms are a few examples of what you might consider including within your agreement:
- Requirements regarding the storage and securing of disclosed confidential information. The disclosing party might require the following of specific security protocols.
- Details regarding the amount of access to information that will be provided and allowed. The person signing the agreement often has a requirement to acknowledge restrictions.
- Limits and restrictions placed on the employee in regards to sharing confidential information with the public and with other employees.
- Requirements to notify the appropriate persons if any unauthorized disclosure of information occurs.
- Limits regarding the copying or transmission of information.
- Restrictions regarding destroying confidential information without the appropriate consent.
- How the handling of confidential information occurs once a termination of the confidentiality agreement happens. This might include details regarding when information is no longer considered confidential and/or how information is to be returned to the person disclosing the confidential information.
- Consequences for breaching the agreement.
Obviously, there are many different pieces of information that are crucial to include within this confidentiality agreement. As you certainly do not want to leave any costly loopholes within your terms, it is always wise to have a business lawyer in Alberta draft or review your agreement before you have it signed.
What Is Confidential Information?
One of the most important things to consider when creating any type of nondisclosure agreement is how you are going to define confidential information. You might feel that it should be obvious which types of information should not be accessed or shared, but your new employee or business partner may not understand. Not defining your confidential information can also make it much more difficult for you to legally enforce your agreement.
When defining confidential information within your confidentiality agreement in Alberta, you might stipulate that this pertains to:
- All information exchanged prior to the signing of the agreement;
- All information exchanged verbally, electronically, or through any other means;
- Information observed by the signing party, either at the office or our on site visits;
- Anything marked confidential;
- Information that is not accessible to those outside the business;
- Any information the signing party should reasonably expect to be confidential;
- Information derived from confidential information; and lastly
- Information protected via security measures.
There are many different ways to define confidentiality. Some are more ambiguous than others, and it is often necessary to use multiple definitions. You might even tailor your definition to refer to very specific types of information that are relevant to your business.
Whichever definition you choose, we recommended that you work with an Alberta business or corporate lawyer to perfect the language of your confidentiality agreement and to ensure that you are protecting yourself, and your information, legally. An experienced attorney can help you to identify important factors that you might be overlooking when drafting this crucial protective agreement.
When Do You Need A Lawyer?
For example, the following are examples of the time you need to hire a non-disclosure contract or confidentiality agreement lawyer when:
- Hiring new staff;
- Retaining contractors or consultants;
- Dealing with investors;
- Selling your business;
- Refinancing your business; and lastly
- If someone has violated a non-disclosure or confidentiality contract you had in place.
Confidentiality Agreement Lawyers In Calgary
The confidentiality agreement Lawyers at Kahane Law Office can help with your non-disclosure contract and/or confidentiality agreement legal needs. Our corporate lawyer team can help draft or interpret agreements and our litigation lawyers can help defend them. CONNECT NOW. We can be reached toll-free at 1-877-225-8817 (or 403-225-8810 locally in Calgary, Alberta), or email us directly here.