A whistleblower is anyone who has and reports any insider information regarding illegal actions in an organization. Company employees, suppliers, clients or any other individual who has somehow become conscious of illegal activities taking place within the business by means of seeing the behavior or just being told about it can become a whistleblower. Whistleblowers are generally protected by law from retaliation after making a disclosure.
Countries which are considered developed, for example the United Kingdom, United States, and Australia, have created regulations that govern the act of whistleblowing.
In the U.K., the Public Interest Disclosure Act (1998) was made to offer protection to employees in the private and public sectors as well as the voluntary sector for a comprehensive range of disclosures. A disclosure of information can be deemed qualifying if an employee has reasonable proof and believes that the information he/she discloses will show one or more of the following to have happened sometime in the past, is happening now or is highly likely to happen in the future:
• Any type of criminal offence
• Any miscarriage of justice
• Any breaches of a legal obligation
•…show more content… SOX 2002 also contains provisions pertaining to civil matters that safeguards whistleblowers who are employed by publicly traded companies from any form of discrimination, and any criminal provisions disallowing retaliation against employees in both private and public companies, who whistle-blow to any law enforcement