Georgia Trade Secret Law: Key Developments and Trends in Trade Secret Litigation

Introduction

Georgia has an unusually strong platform for trade secret disputes because many of its major industries are information-heavy: fintech/payments, logistics/supply chain, cybersecurity, software, healthcare technology, aerospace/manufacturing, and energy. In particular, Georgia is a fintech leader: “Transaction Alley” includes more than 200 fintech companies, and Georgia-based payment processors reportedly handle about 70% of US transactions. Georgia also promotes itself as the Southeast’s logistics and supply-chain hub, with major transportation, distribution, warehouse, port, and infrastructure assets. That combination means that trade secret disputes in Georgia often involve customer data, pricing models, algorithms, source code, payment systems, sales pipelines, manufacturing know-how, technical drawings, and employee mobility.

The Georgia Trade Secrets Act (GTSA), codified at O.C.G.A. § 10-1-760, et seq, was enacted in 1990. Since enactment of the federal Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA) in 2016, trade secret claims in Georgia are frequently filed in federal court under both statutes.

The line between access and misappropriation: Georgia’s “improper means” requirement

A threshold issue in Georgia trade secret litigation is distinguishing lawful access from actionable misappropriation. Georgia courts consistently hold that mere access to – or possession of – trade secrets does not, by itself, constitute misappropriation.

Trade secret misappropriation requires improper use, acquisition, or disclosure. O.C.G.A. §§ 10-1-761(2)(A)–(B). See also RoadSync, Inc v Relay Payments, Inc, 2022 WL 4715656, at *4 (ND Ga Sept 30, 2022).

The distinction between access and misappropriation is especially significant for customer lists. Under the GTSA, an employer’s customer lists may be protectable property, but a former employee’s knowledge of customer information is not. In Tronitec, Inc v Shealy, the court held that the plaintiff must show a tangible customer list was misappropriated; the defendant’s prior access and the lists’ similarity “does not imply a physical taking.” Tronitec, Inc v Shealy, 249 Ga. App. 446 (2001). Thus, employers must demonstrate that a former employee actually took a physical or digital copy of the list, not merely that the employee recalls customer names from memory.

Courts have extended this principle to employees who email documents to themselves. In Angel Oak Mortgage Solutions LLC v Mastronardi, 593 F Supp 3d 1234, 1244–45 (ND Ga 2022), the court dismissed trade secret claims under both the GTSA and the DTSA against an employee who emailed documents to himself during employment, despite contractual provisions prohibiting disclosure of trade secrets and requiring return of confidential information upon termination.

The court found that by sending business information to his personal email, the defendant did not “disclose” or “publish” it to others – he simply transferred to himself information he already had access to as an executive. As the court observed, “moving information from one storage location to another – both controlled by the same person – does not "use or apply" that information within the ordinary meaning of those words.” Id.

The court in Angel Oak similarly held that the return-of-information provision “says nothing about whether [the employee] can send himself information in the first place; it only demands that he give it back later.” Id. at 1245. See also Putters v Rmax Operating, LLC, 2014 WL 1466902, at *3 (ND Ga Apr 15, 2014) (no misappropriation when defendant improperly accessed trade secrets after resignation because he “initially acquired the alleged trade secrets during his employment” in a permissible manner). Together, Angel Oak and Putters underscore that Georgia courts will not treat retention or transfer of information as misappropriation absent evidence of actual unauthorised use, clear breach of agreement, or third-party disclosure.

While mere access or retention is insufficient, courts readily find misappropriation where evidence shows actual competitive use. In RoadSync, Inc v Relay Payments, Inc, 2022 WL 4715656 (ND Ga Sept 30, 2022), the court denied a motion to dismiss where the complaint alleged that departing employees downloaded trade secrets the day before leaving, deleted evidence of their activity, refused to return company property, started a competing company, and launched a product that “mimics key features” of the plaintiff’s software. Id. at *5–6. RoadSync illustrates that the timing and circumstances of document acquisition – combined with subsequent competitive conduct – can transform apparent mere access into actionable misappropriation.

The Stimlabs litigation further illustrates how this line can shift as a case develops. In Stimlabs LLC v Griffiths, 2025 WL 3567175 (ND Ga Mar 27, 2025), the plaintiff alleged that its former employee downloaded over 10,000 confidential documents shortly after learning of her separation. The court denied the plaintiff’s TRO motion, finding no evidence that the employee accessed the documents for any purpose “other than to do her job at the time.” Id. at *3.

After the complaint was amended, however, the court denied a motion to dismiss, finding that alleged breaches of employment agreements, policies, and training obligations were sufficient allegations of “improper means”. See also Kitchens v Peoplescout, Inc, 2024 WL 3313361, at *13 (ND Ga May 24, 2024) (holding that a plaintiff who acquired trade secrets during employment nonetheless misappropriated them because the employee was bound by confidentiality restrictions).

The court in Stimlabs concluded that “[b]ecause Griffiths is alleged to have uploaded and copied [plaintiff’s] trade secrets onto unauthorised devices and her personal Google Drive without [plaintiff’s] permission and in direct violation of her Employment Agreement, the Amended Complaint plausibly alleges that she acquired the trade secrets by improper means.” Stimlabs, at *3. The Stimlabs proceedings demonstrate that the difference between a failed and a viable misappropriation claim often hinges on whether the plaintiff can allege specific contractual or policy violations that elevate routine document access into “improper means”.

The inevitable disclosure doctrine: Georgia’s firm rejection

Georgia has definitively rejected the inevitable disclosure doctrine as an independent legal claim. In Holton v Physician Oncology Services, LP, 292 Ga 864 (2013), the Georgia Supreme Court held that the doctrine “is not an independent claim under which a trial court may enjoin an employee from working for an employer or disclosing trade secrets.” Injunctive relief requires actual evidence of a protectable trade secret and either actual or threatened misappropriation under the GTSA. The mere probability that an employee will disclose a former employer’s secrets by virtue of a new role with a competitor is insufficient.

The inevitable disclosure doctrine, in its traditional formulation, provides that “a plaintiff may prove a claim of trade secret misappropriation by demonstrating that defendant’s new employment will inevitably lead him to rely on the plaintiff’s trade secrets.” Holton, 292 Ga at 868. The doctrine has been applied in other jurisdictions to prevent former employees from working for competitors. See PepsiCo, Inc v Redmond, 54 F3d 1262, 1269 (7th Cir 1995). As the court in Holton noted, the doctrine effectively “may impose a noncompete covenant where one does not exist or, as in this case, extend a covenant not to compete beyond the time negotiated by the parties.” Id. Georgia has refused to adopt this approach, requiring instead affirmative proof of actual or threatened misappropriation.

Holton involved an appeal from a lower court injunction prohibiting an employee from working for a competitor. The injunction was premised on a finding that the employee “would inevitably disclose his former employer’s trade secrets.” Holton, 292 Ga at 864. The Georgia Supreme Court observed that the former employer “did not present evidence that [the former employee] had shared any trade secrets, disclosed any confidential information, or shown an intent to use proprietary information.” Id. The employee testified that he had no trade secret documents in his possession and that his new employer had instructed him to honour his confidentiality agreement. Id. The former employer’s CEO conceded he had “no knowledge” that the employee retained any documents but was confident the employee “retained knowledge of major company initiatives ‘in his head.’” Id.

The Georgia Supreme Court thus concluded that “it is the likelihood of disclosure from matters in [the former employee’s] memory that forms the basis for the trial court’s finding of inevitable disclosure.” Id. The practical significance is clear: in Georgia, an employer seeking to prevent a former employee from joining a competitor must rely on enforceable restrictive covenants or present concrete evidence of actual or threatened misappropriation – speculation about what an employee might reveal is not enough.

Two earlier Georgia Supreme Court decisions further define the limits of trade secret protection in the employee-departure context and illustrate why Georgia’s framework resists inevitable disclosure.

In Avnet v Wyle Laboratories, Inc, 263 Ga 615 (1993), the Court held that a former employee’s personal knowledge of customer information was not a “trade secret” under the GTSA, even though tangible customer lists containing the same information were protectable. Tangible, documented information can be protected as an employer’s property, but an employee’s internalised knowledge cannot be enjoined. This rule directly forecloses the most common form of inevitable disclosure theory – which typically relies on retained mental knowledge – from serving as a basis for injunctive relief.

DeGiorgio v Megabyte Intern, Inc, 266 Ga 539 (1996), reinforced this principle. The Court upheld an injunction based on evidence that the former employee had physically taken tangible customer and vendor lists, but reversed the portion that “effectively proscribed use of personal knowledge”, holding it was “impermissibly overbroad”. Together, Avnet and DeGiorgio establish that Georgia courts will protect against the use of tangible, misappropriated trade secret material but will not enjoin employees from using knowledge they carry in their own minds – even if that knowledge overlaps with an employer’s confidential information.

Trade secret identification: the “reasonable particularity” standard

A frequent battleground in Georgia trade secret litigation is whether the plaintiff has identified its trade secrets with sufficient specificity. Georgia courts require identification with “reasonable particularity”, a standard that demands more than generalised descriptions but stops short of requiring full disclosure of the secrets themselves at the pleading stage.

Georgia federal courts impose a two-tiered reasonable particularity requirement – one at the pleading stage and a stricter one during discovery. At the pleading stage, a plaintiff must allege sufficient facts to plausibly show a trade secret was involved and to give the defendant notice of the material it claims constituted a trade secret. During discovery, the standard escalates: under DeRubeis v Witten Technologies, Inc, 244 FRD 676 (ND Ga 2007), a plaintiff must provide a “sufficient description” so that (1) the defendant is on notice of the claims’ nature, and (2) the defendant can discern the relevancy of requested discovery. Critically, a plaintiff must make this identification before obtaining discovery from the defendant. Failure to satisfy this standard at any stage – from complaint through summary judgment – carries severe consequences, including loss of discovery rights, dismissal of claims, and summary judgment.

DeRubeis defined “reasonable particularity” through four policy rationales: (1) preventing “fishing expedition” lawsuits designed to discover a competitor’s trade secrets; (2) enabling the court to determine the permissible bounds of discovery; (3) allowing defendants to mount an effective defence; and (4) preventing plaintiffs from “mold[ing] [their] cause of action around the discovery [they] receive.” Id. at 681-82.

DeRubeis has become a frequently cited authority in the Northern District of Georgia, and its two-part test – notice and relevance-discernment – has been widely adopted.

Both the DTSA, 18 U.S.C. § 1839(3), and the GTSA, O.C.G.A. § 10-1-761(4), inform the particularity standard. Under the DTSA, a “trade secret” encompasses “all forms and types of financial, business, scientific, technical, economic, or engineering information” if the owner has taken reasonable measures to maintain secrecy and the information derives independent economic value from not being generally known. Georgia’s counterpart is substantially similar. Georgia federal courts often apply the same reasonable particularity analysis to both statutes. See RoadSync, Inc, at *2 and *6.

While “trade secrets need not be disclosed in detail” at the pleading stage, Earthcam, Inc v Oxblue Corp, 2012 WL 12836518, at *9 (ND Ga Mar 26, 2012), the plaintiff must “allege sufficient facts to plausibly show a trade secret was involved and to give the defendant notice of the material it claims constituted a trade secret.” DynCorp Int’l v AAR Airlift Grp, 664 F. App’x 844, 848 (11th Cir 2016).

The 2025 decision in FTI Consulting, Inc v Secretariat Advisors, LLC, 2025 WL 756024 (ND Ga Ma. 7, 2025), confirms a relatively lenient pleading threshold. The court sustained claims where FTI alleged trade secrets in “customer lists, personnel information including performance evaluations, compensation levels, and other confidential information bearing on the relative skills and merits of FTI professionals, financial information, marketing information, and other confidential strategic business information.” Id. at *9. The court rejected the argument that some information might be publicly available, reasoning that “[t]he fact that some of the information – such as employee compensation – may have been shared lawfully or obtained from public sources does not deny the existence of a trade secret, especially where the alleged information includes other information – such as FTI’s client lists – that plausibly would not be ‘generally known.’” Id. Allegations of specific protective measures – “need-to-know” restrictions, password protections, and encrypted databases – combined with non-disclosure obligations, satisfied the secrecy element at the pleading stage. Id.

The consequences of failing to meet the standard are illustrated by Card Isle Corp v Farid, 689 F Supp 3d 1273 (ND Ga 2023). There, the plaintiff claimed a trade secret based on “the combination of its technical know-how, approach to solving problems, and organisation of individual pieces of technology.” The court held that trade secrets must be defined with “reasonable particularity”, especially when the claim rests on a combination of information, “sufficient to separate the trade secret from matters of general knowledge in the trade.”

The court in Card Isle dismissed the claims, holding that descriptions of “know-how” and “problem-solving approach” were “too vague and too inclusive to be considered a trade secret” because they “do not provide sufficient notice to the Defendants or the Court about the boundaries of [the] trade secret.” 689 F Supp 3d at 1289–90. The identification of a trade secret must “distinguish secret information from matters that may be known in the industry.” Id. at 1290. The court accordingly granted summary judgment for the defendant. Id.

By contrast, courts find the particularity standard satisfied where plaintiffs provide concrete, bounded descriptions. In RoadSync, 2022 WL 4715656, at *3-4, the court found adequate specificity where the plaintiff identified source code for specific software functionalities, customer lists and data compilations, and detailed customer information including “key contacts, decision-makers, volumes, proposed and acceptable prices, payment and purchase histories, contact history, and potential revenue.”

However, the court dismissed other claims based on vague categories like “product road maps” and “workflows”, holding that such “broad categories of information” and “vacuous labels that could refer to pretty much anything” fail to give adequate notice. Id. at *4–5. The lesson is that plaintiffs must draw clear boundaries around their claimed trade secrets – identifying specific data, processes, or compilations rather than relying on broad functional categories.

GTSA pre-emption: scope and emerging limits on ancillary tort claims

The GTSA contains a broad pre-emption provision that can significantly narrow a plaintiff’s litigation strategy. Under O.C.G.A. § 10-1-767(a), the GTSA broadly supersedes conflicting tort and restitutionary claims tied to misappropriation. In Robbins v Supermarket Equip Sales, LLC, 290 Ga 462, 466 (2012), the Georgia Supreme Court held that “the GTSA pre-empts claims that rely on the same allegations as those underlying the plaintiff’s claim for misappropriation of a trade secret.”

This means employers cannot circumvent the GTSA’s requirements – including the prohibition on inevitable disclosure as an independent claim – by recasting the same allegations as a different tort theory. Any claim seeking to enjoin a former employee based on trade secret principles must be grounded in the GTSA and satisfy its evidentiary requirements.

A recent development, however, suggests that GTSA pre-emption may not be as expansive as previously understood. In Angel Oak Mortgage Solutions LLC v Mastronardi, 593 F Supp 3d 1234 (ND Ga 2022), the court refused to extend pre-emption to all confidential information, holding that when claims involve information the plaintiff explicitly characterises as non-trade secrets, they have “independent force because they seek relief for the misappropriation of different material” and thus survive pre-emption. This decision creates a notable split from other Georgia federal courts that had suggested the GTSA pre-empts any claims for misappropriation of proprietary information.

Practitioners should take note: by carefully distinguishing trade secret claims from claims based on other categories of confidential information, plaintiffs may preserve ancillary tort theories that would otherwise be pre-empted under the GTSA.