§356.15. Initiation of proceedings. — Inbound Citations

(d) The following examples of actions that constitute violations of an administrative protective order shall serve as guidelines to each person subject to a protective order. These examples do not represent an exhaustive list. Evidence that one of the acts described in the guidelines has been committed, however, shall be considered by the Director as reasonable cause to believe a person has violated a protective order within the meaning of § 356.15.

(1) Disclosure of proprietary information to any person not granted access to that information by protective order, including an official of the Department or member of the Secretariat staff not directly involved with the panel review pursuant to which the proprietary information was released, an employee of any other United States, foreign government or international agency, or a member of the United States Congress, the Canadian Parliament, or the Mexican Congress.

(2) Failure to follow the detailed procedures outlined in the protective order for safeguarding proprietary information, including requiring all employees who obtain access to proprietary information (under the terms of a protective order granted their employer) to sign and date a copy of that protective order.

(4) Failure to destroy and certify to the Department the destruction of all copies of the original documents and all notes, memoranda, and submissions containing proprietary information at the close of the proceeding for which the data were obtained by burning or shredding of the documents or by erasing electronic memory, computer disk, or tape memory, as set forth in the protective order.

(5) Failure to delete proprietary information from the public version of a brief or other correspondence filed with the Secretariat.

Upon deciding to initiate a proceeding pursuant to § 356.15, the Deputy Under Secretary will request the authorized agency of the involved FTA country to initiate a proceeding for imposing sanctions for violation of a protective order or a disclosure undertaking by issuing a letter of request to charge that includes a statement of the allegation that a protective order or a disclosure undertaking has been violated and the basis thereof.