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whistle-blower

whistle-blower

66 5.0
A person who tells authorities or the public about illegal actions at their workplace
  • noun
  • /ˈwɪsəlˌbloʊər/
translation icon : denunciante
  • But whistle-blower advocates like the Employment Law Group's Zuckerman maintain that the backlash against the SEC's proposed rules is unfounded.
  • claim to be whistle-blowers
  • people who are whistle-blowers
  • also allows whistle-blowers

And then I saw an interview fairly recently with a policeman who's now a whistle blower.

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Examples

  • The administration denied any official torture policy, but then, a whistle blower came forward, CIA officer, John Kiriakou.

  • The whistle-blower reported the company's illegal dumping of toxic waste to the authorities.

  • Well, if it was a whistle-blower, you may have just exposed them.

  • You never get whistle-blowers from Fortune 500 companies.

  • Danny was the whistle blower over at the yard.

  • Your whistle-blower from Vicksburg is gonna testify his company knows about the number of guns that wind up on the black market.

  • People think whistle-blowers are great, but they don't necessarily want one in their organizations.

    Academic text (2004)
  • In addition, they called for a broader definition of whistle-blower beyond individuals to allow nongovernment organizations and labor unions to bring claims.

    Academic text (2011)
  • Part of the law, passed by Congress last July, juices the ability of the Securities and Exchange Commission to entice whistle-blowers to come forward.

    Academic text (2011)
  • We are profoundly indebted to you and other whistle-blowers for your unimaginable sacrifices.

    Blog text (11)

Synonyms

whistleblower
vswhistle-blower
324 6.2

A person who tells authorities about secret illegal acts in an organization to stop harm

is the hyphenated older form rather than the unhyphenated spelling
DOB
vswhistle-blower
  • Slang
9.9

A person who tells the police about someone else's bad actions

is used for telling either authorities or the public about wrongdoing
exposer
vswhistle-blower
6.0

A person who reveals secrets or dishonest acts to the public

focuses on reporting internal wrongdoing within organizations rather than exposing any secret

How Public

whistle-blower
66 5.0
informant
165 5.6

Surface Forms

Morphology

whistle-blower = whistle-blow (semi-transparent) = whistle + blow + er

The agentive formation from the verb 'whistle-blow' is morphologically regular, but the specific figurative meaning relies on the idiom 'blow the whistle' and may not be directly deducible by learners.

Etymology

Whistle-blower comes from the image of someone who blows a whistle in a game or on a ship to 'call attention' to a problem. So a whistle-blower is a person who tells the public or the authorities about bad or illegal actions inside an organization.