High-profile corporate frauds like these all seem to follow the same pattern. First the misconduct is discovered, and then we learn about all of the whistleblowers who tried to stop the fraud much earlier. Congress then tries to enhance whistleblower protections, with varying success.
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act, passed in 2002 after the Enron and WorldCom scandals, was supposed to protect whistleblowerswho uncovered accounting frauds, but judges typically rejectedtheir retaliation claims. The Dodd-Frank Act, approved in 2010, provides financial rewards for certain whistleblowers. Its success is still unclear.
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