In case the Employee
breaches a clause of confidentiality the Employer has a right to claim for the compensation
of damages it has suffered. In order for the Employer to implement this right, the Manager of Company shall make sure the following tasks has been
implemented:
- The local documents of the Company states which information shall be treated as confidential information.
The Employee is instructed on what information the
Employer considers to be confidential.
Appropriate measures have been taken to keep this
information protected (including but not limited to establishing a clause of
confidentiality in the Employment Contract or Local Regulations).
The Employee is
liable for breach of confidentiality clause if it is proven that there was the
Employee‘s illegal activity, fault, damages suffered by the Employer and causal
relationship between the activity and the damages.
Noteworthy, it
is enough for Employee to breach the confidentiality clause set in the
Employment Contract to consider his/her activity illegal. The Court
decision judged the illegal activity limited to the transfer of confidential
information to the third party. The illegal activity in this case concluded of
forwarding the emails with confidential information that had been sent by the Employer
to the Employee from professional email address to personal and third parties‘
email addresses after the termination of employment. The use of this information was not evaluated
by the Court.
The Case Law
provides that penalty agreed in the Contract shall be considered as future
damages of the Company set in advance. Therefore, the creditor shall have a
right to claim for a compensation agreed without additional calculation of the
amount. Still, the Court shall precise
the amount of compensation in accordance to circumstances of the case – the Court
may reduce the penalty agreed if the amount required does not meet the criteria
of fairness, reasonableness and integrity.
14.04.17
