You are the network administrator for a rather large company. You have a young family and need your job to support them. As part of your responsibility as a network administrator is to monitor the emails for the organization. Usually this just means occasionally allow through emails for staff members that have been accidentally blocked by the spam filters.
One day you get a helpdesk request from a staff member asking for an email to get released. Normally it’s standard procedure except this time the request has come from the wife of a very good friend of yours. You recognize the name on the helpdesk request so quickly attend to the problem. As part of the procedure you need to manually open up the email to ensure that it isn’t spam, so you do and you discover that it certainly isn’t spam. You find that it’s actually an email to your friends wife from her lover. You scan the rest of the contents of the email and there is no doubt that she has been having an affair for some time now.
You release the email, but you can’t decide what to do. You’re initial reaction is to call your friend up and tell him about the email, however you quickly realize that company policy is very strict about revealing the contents of confidential emails of staff members regardless of the contents and unless someone’s life is in immediate danger, under no circumstances are you permitted to reveal the information.
In any case you know that revealing this information presents great risk, because even if you don’t do it directly, there is a good chance that the dots will be joined somewhere along the line and you will be found out. However you feel that by not telling you friend that you are aiding his wife get away with adultery and this troubles you greatly.
What do you do?
I'd print out the email and tell him in person, telling him that this is risking my career. Dots could still be joined, but the thought of a close friend being lied to and cheated on would be too much to bear.
ReplyDeleteI would confront the wife first. Tell her that I found her out and if she doesn't tell him that I will. Then the ball is in her court.
ReplyDeleteI'd confront the wife. I wouldn't give an ultimatum but I would let her know that regardless, things were about to change. She would no longer be allowed in my home or out to dinner. Eventually, I'm sure, her husband would connect dots and begin to question things.
ReplyDeleteWhy would it trouble me greatly? Solving the relationship woes between my friend and his wife are not my responsibility. If he is a loving/attentive husband, he should know that something is wrong with the relationship. If he doesn't care enough to even notice there is a problem, how can we say that she is the only one abandoning the relationship?
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