ABSTRACT
The risk of having proprietary information compromised or jeopardized generally falls into four major categories.26
1. Verbal: One of the greater risks to the loss of proprietary information is the employee who is privy to certain confidential data or information, and who unfortunately openly discusses such information in conversations he or she may consider private but in fact are in public forums where others can overhear them. Professional intelligence professionals seeking information from their employers’ competitors will use every trick in the trade using the target as a new found friend or exploiting the naiveté of the subject to talk business. They are known to frequent local restaurants or hangouts, where the opportunity exists to overhear conversations around them. Moreover, employees are often the subject of telephone calls from individuals specifically trained to elicit information that could be revealed unknowingly.
