Re:Officer of China’s People’s Liberation Army Arrested at LAX
by true_religion on Friday June 12, 2020 @11:06PM
(#23506401)
The analogy is a bit silly. The layout of my home is on file at the county records office, and accessible online.
The real issue at hand is that he is suspected of something worse than merely copying a lab layout. Is a laboratory setup even protected? In many cases an experiment will elude replication because the lab setup was not properly documented.
Re:Officer of China’s People’s Liberation Army Arrested at LAX
by nomel on Friday June 12, 2020 @11:07PM
(#23506404)
Thinking that the quality of science is related to the layout of a lab is like thinking the creativity and beautiful of a piece of art is related to the location and color of the bin the artist stores their tools in.
Re:Officer of China’s People’s Liberation Army Arrested at LAX
by AtHeartEngineer on Friday June 12, 2020 @11:35PM
(#23506550)
That information may be used to assist in the theft of research down the line by someone else. Someone else could know exactly where someone's office is and what to grab out of there. Or what labs to try to get jobs/internships/etc in to be closer to a lab they want access to that they likely wouldn't get a job in.
Labs have sensitive areas too. Knowing the layout of them helps not just in-and-out operations but can also guide other kinds of educated guesses. Do lab staff in their offices have direct views of the lab equipment or are they separate? etc