Privacy and secrecy laws, national security breach?

On Sep 2, 7:09 am, Arthur Rubin <ronniru...@sprintmail.com> wrote:
> Suppose that, through legitimate access to classified information, you
> know that a crime is being committed, or
 * * *
> a serious breach of National Security or the probable injury
> to millions of people, as in "Silkwood".)  To whom could one report it
> without violating the law?

Well, there's lots of different laws out there dealing with privacy, secrecy, and espionage in corporate, personal, and government contexts.   Your hypo sounds like it would involve all 3 levels and one would have to carefully consider each of the various laws that may impinge on one's highly particular facts; your hypo is too general to give a specific answer.   So it's really hard to tell whether, e.g. your protagonist could report his suspicions to a fellow government agent with an equal or higher security clearance, without thereby violating corporate trade secret protections.  Conversely, he may not be allowed to report it to corporate higher-ups who would preserve trade secrecy if he may thereby be in violation of his government security clearance.   You didn't make this easy, did you?

OTOH sometimes one may feel morally compelled to just cut the Gordian knot and blab, without regard to the formalities of the law.   That is, of course, illegal and he is likely to be prosecuted and/or sued.  One should do so only if one feels strongly that one must answer to a higher moral authority and is willing to accept the possible consequences.  Not that I am advocating that, mind you, but it is one possible way your protagonist may resolve his dilemma.  Think of Danial Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, if you want an actual historical example of how this kind of thing played out.   But note with caution that depending on the current state of affairs in actual enforcement of the various secrecy laws, YMMV considerably.

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