22 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY MARCH 13-19, 2025 www.montereycountynow.com Do you have a story idea you’d like the Monterey County Weekly to cover? We at the Weekly/Monterey County Now rely on our readers to suggest story ideas and help guide our journalists on where to be, what questions to ask and what documents to request from public agencies. As you can read in the annual Foilies Awards (see p. 18), submitting requests for public records does not always yield a response. While members of our newsroom routinely file California Public Records Act requests and U.S. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, we don’t always obtain documents that way that enable us to advance a story. Sometimes, it requires a whistleblower sharing a document. We take our obligation to protect sources very seriously, as there are risks associated with leaking documents. The guide below is produced by the Freedom of the Press Foundation with more detail and guidance for would-be sources. If you have a story to share we’d like to hear it, but want to be sure you are informed and can make smart choices about balancing information disclosure with personal safety. You can always reach us with a phone call, an email, snail mail or by using our online tipline at tipline. montereycountynow.com. And to learn more about the Freedom of the Press Foundation and dive deeper into whistleblower guidance, visit their website at freedom.press. —Sara Rubin, editor Over the years, we have witnessed abuse and mismanagement in the government and private sector—sometimes bad and sometimes worse—that need to be brought to public attention. For those who would leak information about such misdeeds to the press, giving tips to journalists can be risky and may violate previous legal agreements with the leaker’s organization, such as a nondisclosure agreement or contract. But sometimes, it can also be an effective and courageous way to call attention to misconduct. This guide describes basic steps for minimizing potential risk when sharing sensitive information with a news organization. We want to be clear that no piece of software, nor security recommendation, will be 100-percent effective, and the decision to blow the whistle may invite scrutiny or retaliation. At the same time, it may be a choice that drives necessary institutional change. Before reaching out to the press, think carefully about what you can do to minimize that risk and stay as safe as possible. Before moving ahead, do you have a strong tip? A good tip requires clear evidence and should be the basis for a story that the broader public needs to know about. So, for instance, whether or not you have evidence, the broader public might not need to know that a neighbor refuses to pick up after her dog on the morning walk. On the other hand, allegations of corruption or illegality among public officials are certainly newsworthy, but those claims will not make it into a published story without verifiable evidence. Proceed with caution. Be cautious about behaviors that could make you readily identifiable as a source. Keep all of your leaking activities outside the view of your organization. That means no calling from work, no emailing from a work email address, and staying off work devices or wireless networks. It’s common for well-resourced organizations to keep logs of activities on employees’ workplace devices and online activities. Likewise, sometimes workplaces have “BYOD” (bring your own device) technologies that could allow them to log your activity on your personal device. Similarly, a visit to a news organization’s tip page (like tipline.montereycountynow.com) may be logged by your workplace. This is why it’s so important to limit your leaking activities to devices and networks that your workplace doesn’t control. Has your workplace ever required you to install monitoring software (or software of any kind) on your work or personal device? If so, you probably don’t want to use those devices for any whistleblowing activities. Be cautious about giving tips on anything that only you could know or materials that only you could access. And consider whether the increased risk of being caught sharing these kinds of materials is worthwhile, or if you feel you have a strong moral obligation to do so. If you are the only one at your organization surfacing a specific grievance, and information about that grievance is later reported by the press, it may give your organization a strong hint about who shared the information. Don’t tell anyone about your leaking activities (even perhaps the journalist or news organization you’re leaking to), except where absolutely necessary and in cases where you may want legal advice from a practicing lawyer. Tactics for minimizing risk. There are a lot of ways to minimize the risk of a tip being tied to you, like potentially through your continued communications with reporters. Send your materials through physical mail. You can mail electronic documents (e.g., on an SD card) or physical documents through ordinary mail. Be warned: The U.S. postal service takes pictures of the exterior of physical mail, so don’t use a return address that is associated with you. Mail it in from a sidewalk mailbox in a location you don’t usually frequent. If you have a particular reporter you want to look into your story, write their name on the envelope. Call from a phone number unconnected to you. For example, go to a business you don’t usually go to and ask to use their phone. You can also buy a cheap cell phone and a prepaid phone card that cannot be traced back to you. But know this involves several careful steps: You must pay with cash, and if your organization can have access to phone location records, it’s best to only turn on the phone in locations unassociated with you. That also means using the phone in locations separate from your permanent phone. If you can, remove the battery when it’s not in use. Use Signal for private messaging. Signal is a secure, free, and open source messaging app for iPhones and Android devices. Signal gives you endto-end encrypted messages and phone calls, and only retains your phone number, your signup date, and when you were last active. In Signal, you can also make messages automatically self-destruct for everyone in the conversation after a set amount of time. This makes it significantly harder (but not impossible) to eavesdrop on your conversations. Note that Signal allows usernames, so you do not need to give your name or phone number to a news organization unless you choose to. (To find Weekly staff members’ Signal usernames, visit montereycountynow.com/ site/contact.html.) Use a whistleblower submission system. In the case of the Monterey County Weekly/Monterey County Now, you can use the whistleblower submission form online at tipline.montereycountynow.com. While you can submit anonymously on that platform, you should understand the risks. Sharing information with the press is not always an easy decision, but your information can help to hold powerful people and institutions accountable. We Accept Tips Guidance on how to share sensitive documents with the press. By the Freedom of the Press Foundation A good tip requires clear evidence and should be the basis for a story that the broader public needs to know about. SHUTTERSTOCK
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