Protecting your Trade Secrets, Commercial, and Financial Information

An application may include technical data and other data, including trade secrets and commercial or financial information that are privileged or confidential, which the applicant does not want disclosed to the public or used by the Government for any purpose other than application evaluation. Examples of documents that may contain proprietary information include the commercialization plan and the project narrative.

To protect such data, any document uploaded as part of your application must be marked in accordance with one of the following examples:

  1. IP Markings Example 1 – Underline Method
  2. IP Markings Example 2 – Highlight Method
  3. IP Markings Example 3 – Brackets Method
  4. IP Markings Example 4 – Vertical Line Method