IANAL but I believe reverse engineering for duplication is legal. You can't violate a patent, but trade secrets are called "secrets" because once they are out t

IANAL but I believe reverse engineering for duplication is legal. You can't violate a patent, but trade secrets are called "secrets" because once they are out they are out. You protect secrets with NDAs so they don't get out. You're supposed to protect things that the public will see with patents if you want to protect them.