Retaliation, Pre-taliation, and Whistleblower Hotlines: How Compliance Officers Can Fight the Biggest Challenge They Face

By Thomas Sullivan Last updated May 5, 2018

Handling whistleblowers is one of the biggest challenges facing most compliance officers. Furthermore, recent actions taken by the SEC are de facto policy pronouncements expanding the range of whistleblower risks compliance officers face. This article will review the three primary concerns that compliance officers have about whistleblowers: how to stop retaliation; how to avoid pre-taliation; and how to design whistleblower hotlines.

If any single concept has risen to the front of regulatory enforcement lately, it’s this: protect the freedom of whistleblowers to raise the alarm about misconduct.

Certainly, we’ve seen that in the United States, where the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) has given one example after another of how much it wants to protect and reward whistleblowers. Since the SEC established its Office of the Whistleblower in 2011, the agency has awarded more than $100 million to whistleblowers whose tips led to successful enforcement actions. Two of the largest awards (for $22 million and $17 million) were doled out this summer alone.