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In No. 4:13-cv-01895 (E.D. Mo. Sept. 27, 2024) (“Opinion”), the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri addressed the issue of whether the secrecy laws of another country may prevent discovery in the United States. Specifically, the Plaintiff filed a motion to compel the Defendants to respond to discovery seeking sales information regarding the products accused of infringing the Plaintiff's patents. In opposing the Plaintiff's motion, the Defendants requested a protective order barring the production of such information under Chinese secrecy law. The Defendants urged that a protective order should be granted because the production of information responsive to the Plaintiff's discovery requests could expose Defendants to broad sanctions under the People's Republic of China's (PRC) recently enacted Counterespionage Law. The Defendants relied on the declaration of a Chinese attorney and a letter from the local Bureau of Commerce. The district court acknowledged that it had previously rejected arguments based on China’s Data Security Laws, its Cybersecurity Law, and its Personal Information Protection Law and similarly concluded that the threat of sanctions under the Counterespionage Law was speculative. As such, the court granted the Plaintiff's motion to compel and denied the Defendants' motion for a protective order. dispute resolution and litigation-cross border investigation and litigation