(a) Confidentiality. The Participant shall not use or disclose to any individual, partnership, corporation (whether or not for profit), limited liability company, association, joint stock company, trust, joint venture, unincorporated organization, association or other entity, or governmental entity (each, a “Person”), either during the Participant’s service with the Company Group or thereafter, any Confidential Information (as defined below) of which the Participant is or becomes aware, whether or not such information is developed by him or her, for any reason or purpose whatsoever, nor shall he or she make use of any of the Confidential Information for his or her own purposes or for the benefit of any Person except for the Company Group, except (i) to the extent that such disclosure or use is directly related to and required by the Participant’s performance in good faith of duties assigned to the Participant by the Company with respect to the Participant’s employment with the Company or any Related Entity or (ii) to the extent required to do so by a law or legal process, including a court of competent jurisdiction. The Participant shall not modify, reverse engineer, decompile, create other works from or disassemble any software programs contained in the Confidential Information of the Company unless permitted in writing by the Company. The Participant will, at the sole expense of the Company, take all reasonable steps to safeguard Confidential Information and to protect it against disclosure, misuse, espionage, loss and theft.
For purposes of this Agreement, “Confidential Information” means information that is not generally known to the public (including the existence and content of this Agreement) and that is used, developed or obtained by the Company Group in connection with its business, including, but not limited to, information, observations and data obtained by the Participant during the Participant’s employment with the Company Group concerning (i) the business or affairs of the Company Group (or any predecessor thereof) and (ii) products, services, fees, costs, pricing structures, analyses, drawings, photographs and reports, computer software (including operating systems, applications and program listings), data bases, accounting and business methods, inventions, devices, new developments, methods and processes (whether patentable or unpatentable and whether or not reduced to practice), customers and clients and customer and client lists, information on current and prospective independent sales agents, software vendors or partners and sponsor banks, all technology and trade secrets, and all similar and related information in whatever form. Notwithstanding the foregoing, “Confidential Information” will not include any information that has been published in a form generally available to the public prior to the date the Participant proposes to disclose or use such information. For the avoidance of doubt, this Section 6(a) does not prohibit or restrict the Participant (or the Participant’s attorney) from responding to any inquiry about this Agreement or its underlying facts and circumstances by the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, the Internal Revenue Service, any other self-regulatory organization or governmental entity, or making other disclosures that are protected under the whistleblower provisions of federal law or regulation. The Participant understands and acknowledges that the Participant does not need the prior authorization of the Company to make any such reports or disclosures and that he or she is not required to notify the Company that the Participant has made such reports or disclosures. Moreover, this Section 6(a) does not prohibit or restrict the Participant from disclosing “trade secrets” in accordance with the federal Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2016 (the “DTSA”). The DTSA provides immunity from liability in certain circumstances to Company employees, contractors, and consultants for limited disclosures of Company “trade secrets,” as defined by the DTSA. Specifically, Company employees, contractors, and consultants may disclose trade secrets: (i) in confidence, either directly or indirectly, to a federal, state, or local government official, or to an attorney, “solely for