BERKELEY, Calif. (MarketWatch) -- You'd think the world would be coming to an end after a computer enthusiast discovered and decoded a 32-digit hexadecimal number found in all HD-DVD players (and possibly Blu-ray players, depending on whom you ask). This number is apparently the key to crack the data encryption that prevents the copying of discs.

The code didn't take long to leak onto the Web, and then onto one of the most popular news-sharing sites, Digg.com. Digg immediately got a threatening letter from a lawyer and took down the posting with the code.

As is often the case, a firestorm of user protest ensued. Digg eventually apologized and put the post back on the site, where it proliferated like crazy. It was too late anyway; the code was everywhere because of the so-called scandal.

As a publicity stunt, Digg's waffling could not have worked better -- for Digg.

But the episode reemphasizes the new era in corporate control of trade secrets: It's harder to keep a secret than ever before, and lawyers are not helping.

I think it's time I doled out some advice for the corporate executives who can't bring themselves to admit that it is not 1952 anymore.

“ It's harder to keep a secret than ever before, and lawyers are not helping. ”

First of all, lawyers can be idiots and have no sense of public relations. According to the New York Times and others, this entire current fiasco was started by the too-common threatening letter.

When an attorney sends out threatening letters to people these days, especially to bloggers and other Internet mavens, these documents get scanned and published online to be widely distributed.

Most of these letters are written to sound intimidating, often with a lot of language that's mean-spirited. People, sometimes by the millions, read these and get angry not at the lawyer, but at the company that hired the lawyer. This can lead to a public-relations disaster.

Once something goes out on the Net, it gets copied and posted elsewhere. Even if the original is taken down, other versions appear immediately.

The legal profession has not adjusted to this new phenomenon, and as long as they are being paid by the billable hour, they figure the PR folks (also paid by the billable hour) can fix any problem.

The thinking seems to be a one-dimensional "we did our jobs," CYA approach. Attorneys will claim that they were compelled to act to protect the client.

But if ruining a client's image and reputation, and often turning it into a laughingstock is done in the name of "protecting," then perhaps the legal profession should reconsider whether it's being counterproductive.

The epitome of this has been how the MP3 music-sharing scene -- which was underground and not taken seriously by anyone except a few college kids back in the mid-1990s -- was marketed by lawyers, who waged a holy war against trading at the behest of the Recording Industry Association of America.

This war did nothing but popularize a system of sharing music files, and I can assure you that it went from fringe to mainstream only because of highly publicized legal actions against people who essentially were judgment-proof.

In less than a decade, the music business was decimated.

It's same kind of situation with this mysterious number that cracks the DVD encryption. First of all, nobody, myself included, knows what to do with the code. It is practically useless.

“ Nobody, myself included, knows what to do with the DVD code. It is practically useless. ”

If the lawyers did nothing, it would have languished as a curiosity with perhaps a few crackers developing some software with it. The end result would be a few cracked copies of DVDs running on a few computers here and there.

Because of the lawyers and the nasty letters, now everyone online knows how important this number must be. Boom! Now users get to work on it.

Heck of a job, lawyers.

Investors should be aware of the overall dangers the legal profession present to companies, and how its current and generalized naiveté can sink fortunes overnight. While I know of no corporation that has been bankrupted by this sort of fiasco, it will happen eventually if lawyers doesn't catch up with the times.

Or perhaps some executives should think for themselves.