As long as they remain secret they have protection, but the very act of outing them makes them not secret. I am aware of very few successful suits defending trade secrets.
Plenty of trade secrets are defended successfully.
Trade secrets cases are lost when the owner is claiming something is a trade secret when it doesn't meet the legal definition of a trade secret.
Trade secrets are useful for long-lived secrets like the formula for Coca-cola. But if someone independently develops the same thing you are trying to keep secret too bad.
Also, if the secret accidentally gets out (w/o theft) the trade secret enters the public domain.
Hmm. Sounds like a choice of definition but to my mind some IP that lapses in to public ownership (and so is not protected) doesn't cease to be IP, some IPR cease to exist but I'd still consider that work/invention/mark/design/database to be intellectual property just it's now owned by the public.
