A trade secret is "a plan, process, tool, mechanism or compound which a company desires to keep confidential as a competitive advantage." By definition, trade

A trade secret is "a plan, process, tool, mechanism or compound which a company desires to keep confidential as a competitive advantage." By definition, trade secrets are not patented (that would be public exposure). Also by definition, they are not general knowledge (they must be known only to those inside the company). A trade secret from Google might be the exact set of elements and weightings that go into the search algorithm.