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Comment by maximinus_thrax | Hacker News Reader

> "non-disparagement" clause

Do you believe a civil contract should be able to stop a person from disclosing potential illegal activities?

In the US, a contract can’t supersede laws like those that protect whistleblowers. (I think this is part of how Harvey Weinstein was prosecuted because his NDAs were found invalid)

The author didnt disclose any illegal activities in her book. And she didnt claim whistleblower status.

> The author didnt disclose any illegal activities in her book. And she didnt claim whistleblower status.

Both statements are factually incorrect.

> Wynn-William filed a whistleblower complaint with the Securities and Exchange Commission in April 2024 and with the Department of Justice in 2025, according to her filing.

Also, here's a short but not comprehensive (read the book when it came out and I forget things) list of the sledged illegal activities described in the book:

- Collusion with the chinese authorities

- Securities fraud

- Illegal foreign political contributions

- Sexual harassment and workplace retaliation

I don't know the reasons for why there has been no enforcement/further investigations aside from some congressional circus, especially when Zuck was caught lying to Congress. But I would be willing to bet that they involve money in politics.

… Have you read the book? _Plenty_ of illegal stuff there.

I read the book. Lots of unethical stuff, not so much illegal. There’s no revelation or new info publicly released. If it was illegal, I’d expect prosecution in the past 10 years.

Lots of things I’d like to be illegal. Or I wished were illegal.

What did you read that was illegal?

Not in the book directly, but she did accuse them of securities fraud prior to publication: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/mar/15/whistl...

I don't think such clauses have ever been held to prevent people from testifying in criminal trials. Signing book deals on the other hand...

If it's true that she signed a severance deal, e.g. signed this when she was leaving and therefore already knew she was agreeing to protect a bunch of snakes.. Well she fucked up. At the point when she signed that agreement she was already informed and aware of what kind of people she was agreeing to not disparage.

Still looking for the part where, in acknowledgement of her own culpability, she assigns all book royalties to some charity that, say, provides counseling to troubled teenagers ...

So she’s expected to not only put her own financial life in jeopardy to publish this information, but then to take the money that she does have and donate it all to charity?

One has to live. And there are not a lot of commercial enterprises that pay well that will hire someone who publicly flaunts an employment or severance contract.

Give her a break. It’s amazing how many nits we have to pick with those with little power when they choose to exercise it, that we end up excusing wholesale abuses of power by those who actually monopolize it.

There are a lot of defenders of capital on hn, which is expected, that's totally fine. But I think we should all have a bit of admiration for someone who risked her life to shed light into the internals of an arguably sick business entity.

I doubt such clauses can prevent you from disclosing them to relevant authorities. Disclosing them to the public is a whole other matter.

It’s funny as I see this argument from people who at the same time excuse Snowden for publicly exposing government surveillance overreach when he had similar tools (disclosure to relevant authorities) available to him.

Legitimate whistleblowing has rules. I doubt publishing a book counts as whistleblowing.

What rule says a legitimate whistleblower may leak top secret docs to a set of newspapers? https://oig.nsa.gov/Whistleblower-Information/

Snowden is still a horrible analogy when comparing to this situation.

Snowden released classified data at great personal cost - he is now a US fugitive and will be promptly arrested if he ever tries to leave Russia.

Sarah Wynn-Williams wrote a tell-all book for which she was paid. My understanding is that she also signed the non-disparagement clause as part of her separation agreement, in order to get a substantial severance (someone correct me if I'm wrong).

I've only read parts of Careless People, and I think it's great that Wynn-Williams wrote it and exposed some details at the personal level of how nuts these folks are. But I take issue with framing her as some kind of victim ("Meta stole Sarah Wynn-Williams Voice" - give me a fucking break). Meta wouldn't be able to do shit if Wynn-Williams hadn't told them she'd keep her mouth shut for a pile of money. What did she expect would happen after she received that pile of money and then opened her mouth?

Snowden, similarly, signed a substantial non-disclosure agreement which was a condition of his employment with Booz-Allen.

Of course, considering the NDA was a condition of his employment, he was paid for his work that he could not have done had he not signed said NDA. What did he expect would happen after he received his money and then opened his mouth?

That's my whole point - I've never seen Snowden play the part of the grand victim like Wynn-Williams appears to be doing. He did his job, discovered some bad behavior, and released the information at great personal cost, a cost that he seemed willing to accept (he's obviously not happy about the consequences, but he knew what would happen). I haven't seen blog posts from him about how Booz-Allen "stole his voice".

"disclosing them to relevant authorities" would not bring the message to those affected by such carelessness. I would think "Disclosing them to the public" brings more awareness in the public, and though might be illegal, serves better for public good. Legal is not always just or moral.

This whole thread is about legality. Nondisclosure clauses are purely a legal construct, not a moral one.

It’s kind of murky.

NLRB under Biden seemed to say that yeah you can disclose this to the media, and broad non-disparagements are unenforceable. But it’s also kind of a toss up depending on the NLRB, courts, administration, etc.

Trump’s NLRB has rescinded a bunch of that Biden-era guidance, so what is enforceable and what isn’t? Kind of hard to say at this point.

Arbitration agreed with Meta, but who knows what courts would say.

https://www.whitecase.com/insight-alert/nlrb-requires-change...

https://www.mintz.com/insights-center/viewpoints/2226/2025-0...

Well, the whole point is that courts won't weigh in, because of the arbitration agreement.

I took a negotiations course at university, and there was a section on arbitration vs the courts. There are plenty of good reasons to go with arbitration (employment contracts are not amongst them, though).

The one thing the professor highlighted was that if the arbiter was fundamentally unfair (e.g. civil rights violation), you're screwed. You can't then go to the court and make your case. There's no appeals process, etc.

I'm guessing there is no notion of "precedence" with arbitration, this being one of the reasons.

At the end the book is published.

I do. Illegal activities can be dealt with by the legal system without needing to be publicized first.

The legal system makes illegal activities part of the public record.

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