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French Corporate Environment Not So Whistleblower-Friendly

Client Alert | 1 min read | 01.09.06

It appears that the French government has a very different philosophy from that of the U.S. government when it comes to employee whistleblowers. As the attached article (http://www.crowell.com/pdf/Newsroom/ DataProtection_Dhont.pdf) discusses in depth, far from seeking to encourage and reward whistleblowing, French law is affirmatively concerned that the practice may abuse individuals' privacy and data-protection rights, with the result that in the past year, French regulators and courts have struck down Sarbanes-Oxley-inspired efforts by several American companies to implement ethics hotlines for their French employees, and the most recent French regulatory guidance permits such hotlines only under limited circumstances, and with appropriate safeguards to prevent defamation and protect privacy.

Insights

Client Alert | 8 min read | 07.16.25

The New EU “Pharma Package”: The transferable exclusivity voucher—A comparison of Commission/Parliament/Council positions

In our first alert in this weekly series on the EU Pharma Package we provided some important background and general information about the status of the Pharma Package and how the trilogues work, and in the second alert we discussed the proposed changes to regulatory data protection....