If the email involves sensitive information, this could be a serious problem for the people involved. Or well often hear from contacts on the Hill about something going on behind the scenes, like that a bill is about to be introduced. I agree that the companys response was wrong the sexual harasser should have been fired but in the US, authority doesnt care. But Im a journalist whos covered federal agencies, so I know super exciting to agency employees does not necessarily equal huge news for everyone else. Wait, what the friend is a *journalist*?. Until the boys parents threw the uncle out. Heres what to do. Some offenses are serious enough that a single incident is enough to fire someone. The Expert above is not your attorney, and . I didnt agree with it myself, and knew that it wasnt really possible without raising a lot of money, something my organization just isnt that good at doing. I will be in so much trouble if anyone finds out! your blindsided coworker is not required to enter into a cover-up conspiracy with you. You would never want someone to find out from the news media that they no longer have a job, for example. According to Tessian research, over half (58%) of employees say they've sent an email to the wrong person. Depending on the circumstances, you can indeed get fired for sending what you assume to be a private email or text. Id say forgive that coworker NOWyou put her in a terrible position by being a big blabbering blabbermouth. Having worked in communications and journalism for the past 15 years, I think this ishonestly really bad. In my job I often get embargoed advance copies of speeches that politicians are going to give they send them out to press to help us start working on getting most of a story written and cleared so we can just drop in a few quotes and crowd reactions and publish the story within 5-10 minutes of the speech ending. Your coworker was not at all in the wrong here, OP. It can be exciting to know whats going to happen before it happens, even when the news itself isnt *that* thrilling. My worry, OP, is that you dont see this as sufficiently serious to warrant a firing but I promise you that in most communications positions, it really likely would be. Thats why they told you no. Sure but I think its highly unlikely that someone at OPs level would have access to that. I can remember almost exactly what I said: It was wrong of me to put that information out. This is awkward to frame as apparently it would have passed unnoticed if you hadnt taken aim at your own foot and then pulled the triggerit would be better if you were fired after fessing up to your superiors, rather than involving anyone else. Im a fed and we have annual mandatory training out the wazoo on these kinds of rules, as well as frequent reminder emails from the ethics folks and/or the IGs office. The communications team is often brought on board to develop strategy for organizational decisions that may not be public for weeks or even months. Its very dangerous to OPs professional reputation to assume OP can trust anyone who is unauthorized, including a good friend, with embargoed information. Having a natural, human reaction doesnt mean shes in the wrong field. It could be that the info you leaked was especially confidential, or that theyve been concerned about other leaks and are taking a hard-line stance. And Im not saying it was fair or unfair or whether your previous employer made the right call. I have a friend whose mother did work for an intelligence agency during WW2. Head of the department who everyone hates for non-scandal reasons is stepping down amid a scandal never actually say the words Gross Misconduct. Ive seen many workplaces that dont spend an amount of time discussing confidentiality that is commensurate with its importance, or that dont go into specifics about when it is and isnt ok to tell somebody something you heard at work, and a general statement tends not to hold up to the in-the-moment excitement of oooooh I know THING about CELEBRITY! or whatever. Also to prevent someone who might be a bit dangerous, from hurting you. That's why employers ask employees to sign technology use policies, as it appears yours has - to ensure the employee is aware of policy. blue_haddock wrote: . Sometimes its because someone could obtain an unfair benefit from early access to what will later become public information (e.g., think analogous to insider trading). I mean in the end there is not a lot of reasons to trust either, but demonstrating ongoing cluelessness is not a good way to sell this will never happen again. So if shes genuinely surprised at this outcome, it stands to reason that its new for her, which strongly implies she just hasnt been working very long, which implies youth. [important person 1] and [important person 2] are coming to my office for a press conference. This was a person whose reviews had been glowing up until that moment and I am sure they are still upset that this came out of the blue. Its not the end of the world as long as you adjust your thinking going forward and really try to understand why confidentiality policies exist. I think thats misunderstanding the severity of why what OP did was not ok. Theres any number of non-confidential matters that are embargoed prior to their public announcement. Forgetting the attachment. Agreed. I was often privy to non-public information because I was designing media campaigns around them. Letter writer: If youre still dealing with this emotionally, focus on the facts. (I dont know if the OP explicitly said off the record, but its not like journalists dont handle that all the time when people do.). Just keep it to yourself or youll get fired. And thatsnot great? (For example, my BFF works at the Pentagon. Another public sector worker here. We will always be privy to confidential information in our roles, its the nature of what we do. What Are the Ways to Respond to an Unintentional HIPAA Violation? But your processing of it has to be at one step removed. It was spur of the moment and, as soon as I realized what Id done I circled back to her to clarify that that information was confidential. More commonly it means that you either cant share anything, or you cant share parts that someone could connect to a particular client. So to summarize, while an individual in your circumstance can be fired for the accidental dissemination of confidential employment information, their employer cannot press criminal charges against them, both because a private entity lacks the authority to make that decision and more fundamentally because the accidental dissemination of . (Even before learning it was to a reporter!) Its also true that people do break confidentiality for a variety of reasons, but people who are really really REALLY aware that they are breaking confidentiality and how big the consequences of it are, are also on top of not leaving a footprint that can be traced back to them. (Especially since termination hearings and the related records are often public records once the employee is terminated, so any concerned employer could just do a records request and get the whole story.). ), This didnt involve a records request. I have news from my job that I cannot share with some coworkers. Is this the appropriate place to bring up Anthony Scaramucci not even uttering the phrase off-the-record during his bizarre call to Ryan Lizza and then being upset when his words were published? Good luck with your job search! Just *looking* at the account would get you noticed and your hand slapped (if you were lucky). They got caught. If asked specifially try to describe in detail what happened and what you learned from it, for example: ask if the new employer has clear guidelines on data handling. But your friends profession means you often cant share these types of things with her because of other peoples perceptions about it they dont know your friend, and while she may take off the record seriously, some journalists dont and your coworkers have no way of knowing which type of journalist she is. Im also a public affairs officer for a government agency- one that almost exclusively deals with highly classified information. Like X candidate is running for president!. Non-public just because it hadnt been announced yet isnt the same as the location of the emergency bunker. A very long-term employee who did excellent work, as a joke, made up a fake news release that indicated we got the contract. Does that matter? The initial complaint filed against Google is currently under seal because the judge has asked the bank to redact the Gmail account from its filings. OP doesnt sound naive or too young, either. Confidentiality is not just an issue in communications. Shouldnt she be in trouble too? and there she would be, going down with you. Check out this article on that HERE. But at that very moment, I was in a personal email back-and-forth with another female coworker. You just seem to still want an answer and I picked up on this as a possible avenue to reflect on in your letter. Im sure the letter writer has plenty of that to deal with already. Like, its so obviously wrong that people dont even talk about it. There could be a situation where it might be the journalists job to share the information LW thought they were telling to just a friend. Count your blessings that you just got fired. 2) Told someone you broke a rule. Assuming this is in the US, and were talking about FOIA laws, typically a records request will come through a particular channel (not likely to be some random employee in communications.). 1. Thats the real clincher here for me) and on a personal level with management your position is one of trust and you violated the basis of your work. If youd like to learn more about human layer security and email data loss prevention (DLP), you can explore our content hub for more information. What video game is Charlie playing in Poker Face S01E07? Really? e.g. Specifics dont matter, but to me, being able to explain you told your friend your employer was about to buy this farm to build a park so they bought the farm so they could raise the price and make a profit would make a huge difference in terms of making the OP aware of the consequences of their actions. You can avoid finding yourself in this position by double-checking the recipient email address (especially when autocomplete is involved), the cc field, and the Bcc field. She could have been a secretary or a spy; no one knows because she went to her grave never telling anyone, not even her husband. Bank Sends Sensitive E-mail to Wrong Gmail Address, Sues Google (Also the NASA leaker didnt get fired. THIS ^^^ Whether it is age or just immaturity, there is clearly a major blind spot about the big picture and the potential impact resulting from this behavior. I mean, mayyyyyybe but the OP put the coworker in a really uncomfortable position here, and while Im sure she didnt mean to, thats what she did. ^^. In those cases I have to be even more careful, because minor details might get linked to the news story and suddenly its not anonymous any more. Damn, thats hard core. The protected classes are race, age (40+), sex, national origin, religion, or disability. Once you told your coworker, you dragged her out there on the plank with you. how do I explain being fired for sharing confidential info with a That mindset is just so messed up. ! but you just cant. The emphasis on how not harmful the infraction was is totally hurting your case, OP. Send the attachment in a follow-up email and, in the future, attach the document before you even begin writing your email. Like its going to be easier to find a job because she has the integrity to say she got fired. Fortunately, I was not fired for the mistake, but my employer did call me on the carpet for a very serious discussion on why we cant share any information that we only have access to because we work there, regardless of how sensitive or not sensitive we think it is on a case-by-case basis. But even the first is really really, really bad. Both the affected parties were amazing clients who prided themselves on solid security practices. Despite a good track record and being with this team for a few years now, the rules were made very clear to me and I know I wouldnt be given a second chance in that situation. A member of the public wants some data, they contact anybody in the agency they can think of, the internal employees bounce it around because somehow they dont know who to send data requests to, and finally it gets to us and we respond. It's difficult to prevent a leak from happening again if you don't know how it occurred in the first place. No 2nd chance especially because you knew it was a no-no before you shared. Youve got some great feedback from Alison and I hope it all works out for you. Sometimes they go so far as tell the bearer of the news that they now have to soothe them bc its their fault they feel bad. So. If you lie during the interview and the truth later comes out, thats enough to get you fired. Your failure to understand the gravity of your actions is alarming. Can you get fired for accidentally sending confidential information? The thing is, its a big deal that you were given confidential information and then texted it to a friend. I think the fact finding phone call cleared that up, otherwise OP would have said so? But that was the right response to what you did. The coworker is not a rat or at fault here. +100 to this. What is the correct way to screw wall and ceiling drywalls? super! update: is my future manager a bigoted jerk? Cringe. The main problem is that 'copying data in a very insecure way to be able to bring those data. In a job interview, how do I explain why I was fired? All we can do is learn, rest, and go on another day. If something like this would help, maybe try it. If nothing exculpatory came out in that meeting then maybe firing was the appropriate response. Journalists get embargoed or off-the-record information all the time and are able to play by those rules. Hard disagree. Screw-ups happen. For many fed and state agencies, non-public records _must_ be released on a records request despite their non-public status unless they fit into a narrow set of explicit exemptions. This was a Friday. And in this case, I beleive that is correct. I had the same thoughtthat was very unwise. We received a staff email that shared that they were going to release some BIG news about positive new office changes and remodeling and that there was going to be a BIG press conference in 2 days at our office with a lot of high-up political bigwigs and asked everyone to show up for support. Oh my. It was a big enough thing that they gave you a 1st chance. Also, am I even allowed to bring up the fact that someone ratted me out? Plus you might be doing them a massive favour when it comes to catching a data breach early. Im not curious at all, but Im different. @bent in my experience most companies view the data leaving their possession as the real concern, anything else is secondary. LW, we are all human. Employees also. Theres a great blog called SorryWatch (.com) that analyzes & critiques apologies made by public figures. Only hope going forward is own up flatly and without defensiveness .
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