Do not take source code, client lists, or technical documents upon leaving; do not upload them to personal cloud drives or reuse them at new employers

7. Do not take source code, client lists, or technical documents upon leaving; do not upload them to personal cloud drives or reuse them at new employers

Cost: No cost involved. Before leaving, simply delete all company-related files from your personal computer and cloud drives. The difficulty lies in the fact that some files were written by you personally, making it hard to part with them.

In plain terms: Even code written by you personally remains the company’s intellectual property — taking it away is essentially stealing company assets. Client lists also qualify as trade secrets. In one case, a former employee who took source code and core algorithms of a security inspection system to a new employer was sentenced to 5 years in prison and fined 500,000 yuan; the new employer was fined 4 million yuan. Another individual who exploited system vulnerabilities to download over 33,000 design files was sentenced to 1 year and 10 months in prison and fined 100,000 yuan. Beyond criminal penalties, companies can also pursue separate civil compensation claims.

Benefit: Violating confidentiality obligations by disclosing or personally using trade secrets may result in imprisonment of up to 3 years, along with a fine or both. In more serious cases, the sentence ranges from 3 to 10 years, plus a fine. The Anti-Unfair Competition Law also deems two acts as violations: using technical means to illegally access systems and obtain trade secrets, and aiding or abetting others in breaching confidentiality. Official examples include the aforementioned cases where former employees took source code and algorithms to new employers, resulting in heavy criminal and financial penalties. Additionally, an engineer who stored App module source code on personal devices and later developed a similar product after changing jobs was prosecuted for trade secret infringement nationwide.

Evidence grade: A

Sources: National People's Congress (2020). Criminal Law (Amended in accordance with the Criminal Law Amendment (11), Article 219). <https://jtgl.beijing.gov.cn/jgj/jgxx/flfg/fl/11033925/index.html>; National People's Congress Standing Committee (2025). Anti-Unfair Competition Law (Amended in 2025, Article 10). <https://www.spp.gov.cn/spp/fl/202506/t20250627_699862.shtml>; Supreme People's Procuratorate of China (2025). Typical cases of intellectual property protection by procuratorial organs (Case 7). <https://www.spp.gov.cn/xwfbh/wsfbh/202504/t20250423_693691.shtml>; Supreme People's Procuratorate of China (2020). 2019 Typical Cases of Procuratorate Protection of Intellectual Property Rights (Case 16). <https://www.spp.gov.cn/xwfbh/wsfbh/202004/t20200425_459623.shtml>; Supreme People's Procuratorate of China (2025). Procuratorates punish crimes that infringe on corporate data security in accordance with the law and provide services to ensure corporate innovation and development (Case 5). <https://www.spp.gov.cn/xwfbh/wsfbh/202501/t20250124_680670.shtml>

Notes: Code written by employees remains the company’s property, as stipulated in Article 13 (code developed using company resources belongs to the company). Taking such code away is equivalent to stealing company assets. Client lists are classified as business information and also qualify as trade secrets. Apart from criminal penalties, companies may also file separate civil lawsuits for compensation.