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CIJ Logan Symposium 2020: An interview with Theranos Whistleblower Tyler Shultz — Transcript

by The Centre for Investigative Journalism · 10,528 words · 1,772 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:01[Music]
0:10so
0:10welcome my name is delfin algon and i'm
0:13the executive director of the signals
0:15network
0:16and i'm honored to introduce you and
0:19animate today's conversation
0:21i would like to thank the logan
0:22symposium for organizing the
0:24conversation
0:25entitled blowing the whistle i would
0:28like to thank you tyler
0:30uh for accepting the invitation to
0:33discuss your experience
0:35uh with us today so for the full
0:38disclosure i think i should say that we
0:40know each other a little bit
0:42um because we both live normally in the
0:45san francisco bay area but
0:47more importantly you have been on the
0:50board
0:51of the signals network the non-profit i
0:54funded
0:54three years ago and at the signals
0:58network we support whistleblowers
1:00who have shared public interest
1:02information with the press
1:04and we help we sub-lawyers and
1:07journalists to work together
1:09in order to hold powerful interests
1:11accountable
1:12so that's kind of i hope why it made
1:15sense for you to
1:16accept to help us and now the signals
1:20network is operational in 11 countries
1:23the us and 10 european countries
1:26and that's countries where we support we
1:29saw blowers who have shared
1:31information with the press and for some
1:34logic reason i cannot say publicly where
1:37they are but
1:38they are we sablers who are behind
1:41um some of the major story of our time
1:44from me to stories to corruption
1:47to stories linked to the coronavirus
1:52or health hazards and they shared
1:55information with
1:56media like the new york times npr the
1:59guardian
2:00bbc der spiegel and so on
2:03and most of them come to us from
2:05journalists
2:06or general counsel of media who advise
2:09them to
2:10talk to us if they want to talk to a
2:13lawyer
2:13or get legal advice and then we we help
2:16them
2:18so and in parallel at the signals
2:20network we work with media committee
2:22to protect their sources and to work on
2:25collaboration
2:27uh and investigation based on
2:30information
2:30provided by we saw blower and we already
2:33have coordinated the publication of two
2:36major investigations
2:38with media in the us and europe like
2:40didsai
2:41el mundo media path radio france and so
2:44on
2:45and actually the last one was related to
2:47plasma donation
2:49and was published in july so
2:52on our board we have whistleblowers like
2:54tyler antoine del two
2:56the looks like swissors or lawyers like
2:59ben wisner from
3:00aclu online security expert and so on
3:03and and they all bring
3:05expertise and experience in order to
3:07protect those who
3:09would take risk to share public uh
3:11interest in formation
3:13with the press and to hold powerful
3:15interests accountable
3:17and so basically you tyler you hold a
3:2010 billion dollar company accountable
3:24teranos and that's quite of a story
3:27and i'm i'm really excited to to discuss
3:30it again with you two
3:31today and for those of you who have not
3:34read
3:35the amazing book bad blood written by
3:38the wall street journal journalist john
3:40carrera or for those of you who have not
3:43seen the hbo documentary the inventor
3:46or for those of you who have not
3:48listened to
3:50tyler's podcast thicker than water
3:53and i i will talk about this podcast a
3:55lot because i listen to it and it's
3:57really amazing and i would recommend
4:00to any everyone to to listen to it
4:03thicker than water uh uh available on
4:06audible
4:08so for all of you who don't know about
4:11tyler's story
4:12i will just start by asking tyler to
4:15to explain the whole process again like
4:18from being a young uh graduate
4:21graduate from stanford university hired
4:24by an exciting company called terranos
4:28to to be called by the wall street
4:30journal uh a whistleblower what's
4:33what was this journey um
4:36and uh yeah and really from being
4:39excited to join a company
4:42to to to leave a
4:45hell uh and hope and
4:48thanks god recover from all this so so
4:52yeah tyler
4:53sorry again can you tell us your story
4:56yeah sure i'll uh i'll tell it in the
4:58briefest way possible so we can dive
5:00into some other
5:01other questions but uh yeah so i first
5:04met
5:04elizabeth holmes in my grandfather's
5:06living room because i was a junior at st
5:08samford university at the time he worked
5:11at stanford university
5:13and i got i just got a phone call from
5:14him one day and he said i have this
5:16brilliant woman coming over
5:18to my house for lunch so it'd be great
5:20if you could come over and just listen
5:21in on this discussion
5:22so i had almost no context but i went
5:24over there and that was the first time
5:26that i heard elizabeth
5:28tell the vision of theranos which i
5:29instantly fell in love with
5:32so anything that a central laboratory
5:34could do theranos could do
5:35by just testing a single drop of blood
5:38from your fingertip
5:40and you could do this in point of care
5:41settings and she mentioned things like
5:43medevac helicopters
5:45and battlefields and operating rooms
5:48and drug stores so it sounded like
5:52this was a truly revolutionary
5:54technology
5:55and on top of that she had this very
5:56compelling story of dropping out of
5:58stanford when she was 19 years old
6:00to start this company so she kind of
6:02seemed like the female steve jobs she
6:04even dressed like steve jobs
6:07um so i definitely fell into the hype
6:10along with everybody else and i walked
6:13away from my first meeting with her
6:14thinking that
6:15this was something that i absolutely had
6:17to be involved with
6:18so i followed up with her and was able
6:21to get myself
6:22an internship between my junior and
6:25senior year of college
6:26so during my internship i worked in a
6:29research lab with
6:32all of my co-workers had never seen a
6:34theranos device before
6:36i never saw a theron's device while i
6:37worked there and i think my
6:39probably the biggest takeaway from my
6:42internship was that
6:43secrecy was taken extremely seriously at
6:46theranos
6:47there are barricades up everywhere you
6:49weren't supposed to talk to other labs
6:50about what you were working on in your
6:52lab
6:53a lot of senior scientists had never
6:54even seen the product they were working
6:56on they had never seen that there knows
6:58technology they didn't even know what it
6:59was
7:00um thanos was deep in stealth mode at
7:03the time nobody supposedly no one
7:04outside of theranos knew that they were
7:06even in diagnostics
7:08um so i kind of felt like i was working
7:10at the cia almost it's like i couldn't
7:12say anything about my job
7:14and then i went back to stanford uh you
7:17loved it
7:17you loved working there as an intern i
7:20did i
7:20really enjoyed working there as an
7:22intern um
7:24i continued to kind of build my
7:25relationship with elizabeth
7:27and at that time she was becoming a
7:29little bit integrated into my family she
7:31started coming to our family
7:32christmas parties and birthday parties
7:35and
7:36thanksgivings and things like that um so
7:39it was
7:39almost like she was becoming one of my
7:41cousins
7:43um so my relationship definitely grew
7:45while i was working
7:46uh as an intern um
7:50so then i went back to stanford finished
7:51up my senior year
7:53uh spent the summer traveling through
7:55europe playing guitar on the street had
7:56a great time and then came back and
7:58started working full-time at theranos
8:00and my first day was the day that they
8:02launched the product
8:04so finally they came out of stealth mode
8:06they told the world what they were doing
8:08how they were going to revolutionize
8:09healthcare
8:10so it was a super exciting time for that
8:12to be your first day as a full-time
8:14employee
8:16but at the same time the manager of the
8:18assay validation team which was the team
8:20that was in charge of making sure that
8:21these tests worked
8:23quit on that same day in a very dramatic
8:25way i was told she was crying in the
8:27parking lot
8:28um and then i had a team meeting with my
8:32with my manager who essentially told us
8:34that even though we launched the product
8:37that there were no tests being run on
8:39the product
8:40every test that we collected from the
8:42first walgreens that launched
8:44uh was being run on third-party
8:46equipment or sent out to outside labs
8:49and on top of that they weren't even
8:50collecting finger pricks so essentially
8:52people were going into walgreens
8:54getting a needle in their arm drawing
8:55blood they would bring it back to their
8:57nose their nose would run it on
8:58third-party equipment or send it to
9:00labs like ucsf and and quest diagnostics
9:04and things like that
9:05um so it was really confusing it was a
9:08very confusing first day
9:10and a couple days after that um we got
9:14an email from
9:15sunny who was the president and ceo of
9:17the company
9:18telling all the research labs that we
9:20should stop our experiments
9:22because we were all being moved to this
9:24assay validation team which was the team
9:26that had their their manager quit
9:29and that's when i started working with
9:30the theranos product and
9:32right off the bat you can see that
9:33there's nothing revolutionary about it
9:35there's
9:36just a pipet inside of a box so there
9:38was nothing that that
9:40theranos device could do that i couldn't
9:42do with my own hand
9:44by moving a pipette which is just a
9:46simple
9:47liquid handling cheap instrument in
9:50almost
9:51every lab in the world so it was very
9:54underwhelming
9:55and it could only run one test at a time
9:58so even if we did
9:59have 300 tests validated on this system
10:02if you went and ordered 300 tests
10:04it would need to be run on 300 different
10:05devices so so basically that's
10:08when you were able to see by with your
10:11own eyes
10:12that what was promoted by terranos which
10:15supposedly this
10:17wonderful new machine who could do 300
10:20tests
10:21thanks to one um
10:27did not did not exist and could do
10:30not even one test at a time and that was
10:32when you because you were able to
10:34be to access the machine which was not
10:37the case for a lot of
10:38employees yeah so that was
10:42a huge red flag um it also wasn't a
10:44standalone system so you needed to use
10:46it in combination with other
10:48um like liquid handling robots um
10:52and during on your podcast you even say
10:55that you had to manually close the door
10:59or make the heat uh go down
11:02with your hand or yeah it was it
11:05had some engineering defects so like
11:08the door that you would put the
11:10cartridge in sometimes wouldn't close
11:12so we would have to tape it shut with
11:14tape um there were barcode scanners on
11:16the cartridges that
11:17the device would scan it and they would
11:18know what tests to run but often the
11:20barcode scanner wouldn't even work so we
11:22would rip the
11:23cart the barcodes off put it on a pair
11:25of scissors and stick scissors into the
11:27device and try to get it to scan
11:28it would often be too hot so we'd cool
11:30it down we'd open the door try to wave
11:32our hands sometimes it would be too cold
11:33and we'd
11:34have little blankets that we could put
11:35over it um
11:37tips would fall off we are talking about
11:39the machine which is supposed to be the
11:41gold mine
11:43of at that time was the company already
11:46valued at 10 billion dollars it was
11:50shortly afterwards valued at 10 billion
11:52i'm not sure what it was valued at when
11:54i started working there but it was
11:56you know right around that time it was
11:58valued at nine billion dollars
12:00and i think that evaluation came because
12:02elizabeth was essentially saying
12:04this revolutionary technology is going
12:06to upend the entire laboratory
12:08diagnostics industry
12:09and quest diagnostics is worth nine
12:11billion dollars therefore we are worth
12:13nine billion dollars because we are
12:14going to take all of their business
12:16uh so they were very bold and aggressive
12:18um
12:19and had really had no technology
12:23sorry go ahead and tell us about your
12:25journey working there yeah
12:27yeah so then there were some a few other
12:29red flags where
12:31when regulators came in to actually give
12:33us
12:34our clia certifications that we could be
12:36a certified central laboratory
12:38they were not shown the room that had
12:40the theranos devices and the doors to
12:42the
12:42to the room that had the theranos
12:44devices were locked that day we were not
12:46supposed to go in or out of that room
12:48so the regulators we got our our clear
12:50certification without the regulators
12:52ever seeing a therianos device
12:54so that was a huge red flag and then we
12:57were we
12:57essentially participated in a kind of
13:00audit
13:01or like a safety inspection where we're
13:03supposed to
13:04test a sample and give the results to a
13:06third party who knows the answer
13:08and so when we got that we split it and
13:10we ran it on the therinos platform
13:12and third-party equipment and in some
13:14cases the results were off by more than
13:16300 percent
13:17and we reported the results from the
13:19third party equipment
13:21even though at that time we were
13:23actually running patient samples on the
13:25theranose product
13:26because after i joined that validation
13:29team we ended up expanding the test menu
13:31from zero tests up to seven so by the
13:33time i left we were running seven tests
13:34on the theranos platform
13:37um so all these red flags were kind of
13:38building up for me
13:40and so i actually well i talked to a lot
13:42of my
13:43my co-workers the senior scientists they
13:45were all seeing the exact same things
13:47and
13:48so i went and i actually confronted
13:49elizabeth about some of these things
13:52and she kind of brushed them off a
13:54little bit said i'll set you up with a
13:56meeting with a vice president to go over
13:58these things
13:58i went and i met with the vice president
14:01he
14:02also kind of brushed them off kind of
14:04said like yeah some things we didn't do
14:06perfectly but it's not that big of a
14:08deal
14:09and i eventually just asked him i said
14:11do you actually think that this
14:13test is better than tests that already
14:15exist
14:16and he said i don't think we've ever
14:18claimed to be better than other
14:20technologies which was mind-blowing to
14:22me because that was
14:22that was like the whole point of
14:24fairness is that we're we're better than
14:26conventional technologies um but i went
14:29like
14:29you said that actually it's the syphilis
14:32tests
14:32that made you decide to quit
14:37yeah so the syphilis test was the one
14:39that broke the camel's back for me
14:40because
14:41i was doing the validation for that test
14:43so i was making sure it was safe before
14:45we
14:45we started running real patient samples
14:48and i
14:48saw that our coefficient of variation at
14:51the cutoff level was 43
14:54which means that the standard deviation
14:56was 43
14:57of the value so the variation was
15:00enormous
15:01and then we tested samples that were
15:03known to be positive for syphilis
15:04and we only got 65 correct and we pretty
15:08much pretended like that didn't happen
15:09and we tried again and we got 80 correct
15:12the second time
15:14then we did a study where we compared uh
15:17results from a finger prick versus a
15:19venus draw
15:20and for that we collected samples from
15:22ourselves and from our colleagues
15:24and an alarming percentage of us tested
15:27positive for syphilis
15:29and we literally laughed about it and
15:32the manager our manager said
15:33guys it's not impossible and we
15:37like no one sent out a company wide
15:39email no one went and got retested
15:40everyone just assumed the test didn't
15:42work
15:42and so we put all this data together and
15:44sent it to the statistics team
15:46and to our surprise it passed validation
15:49requirements so they said okay this is
15:51safe and we're going to start testing
15:52real patients using this test
15:54and that was the point for me where i
15:56thought
15:58i know without a doubt that someone is
16:00going to be severely hurt
16:02by this test because if you
16:05have syphilis and you get tested and you
16:07test positive and you get treated it's
16:08not that big of a deal
16:10but if you get tested and it says you're
16:12negative when you actually do have it
16:14you can spread it to other people it can
16:16eventually become a life-threatening
16:18disease
16:19so to me this felt like a really really
16:21big deal and that's when i went and
16:22confronted elizabeth
16:24um and um and when you confronted her
16:28asking questions and and still trying to
16:31to make
16:32terrano's work and do what they were
16:34saying they were doing i mean i think
16:36you came to her by saying
16:38i don't understand and how could we fix
16:40that
16:41and the answer was
16:45see uh uh yeah so i i ultimately wrote
16:49elizabeth a pretty
16:50long email where i just said you know
16:51this is something that i see
16:53um here's data to support what i see and
16:56here's something that i think we can do
16:57to fix it
16:58and at the end of the email i said i do
17:00not mean for this to be attacking in any
17:02way i'm
17:02committed to the long-term vision of
17:04this company and i'm worried that
17:05our current practices will prevent us
17:07from reaching our bigger goals
17:10and she forwarded it to sunny and sunny
17:12responded saying that i was arrogant
17:14ignorant patronizing reckless had no
17:16understanding of basic math science or
17:19statistics and that if i had any other
17:21last name that i would have already
17:23been held accountable in the strongest
17:24way uh which was
17:27maybe let's take a minute because i
17:30don't if
17:31nobody knows about this why your last
17:34name matters
17:35here you mentioned briefly that you met
17:38elizabeth at your grandfather's house
17:41but you did not describe if someone
17:44doesn't
17:44know um why it matters and who is your
17:48grandfather
17:49and why in a sense it's a lo your
17:52grandfather
17:52allowed you to enter terranos and then
17:56allowed you a certain
17:57level of access and protection for time
18:01yeah that's that's a good point i
18:03accidentally skipped over that part so
18:05about the time where i joined full-time
18:08my grandfather also joined the board so
18:10we kind of started about at the same
18:12time i think um
18:14so who's your grandfather oh yeah and so
18:17my grandfather
18:18uh was the secretary of state for ronald
18:21reagan he was secretary of treasury
18:23and labor for richard nixon um
18:26so he's been yeah so he had a long
18:29career in in politics
18:31and also he was he's also the ceo of
18:33bechtel corporation which is a really
18:34big
18:35um and i mean you say you say it in a
18:39very wikipedia
18:40way uh but the the reality is that
18:44it means that when you were a kid uh you
18:47played with your bicycle in the in the
18:50foot of gorbachev that uh
18:53president bush was hanging out at your
18:54grandfather's garden
18:56so yeah that's that's what it means
19:01yeah so it was kind of funny because i i
19:03had a very very normal
19:05california life you know i my my dad was
19:08a high school biology teacher my mom was
19:10a nurse
19:11um and then we would kind of go from
19:14that world into my grandfather's world
19:16where it's like okay we're having dinner
19:17with henry kissinger and
19:19you know on one occasion uh we ended up
19:22sitting in the backyard with george bush
19:24he was going to go speak at stanford but
19:25there were protests that prevented him
19:27from getting there so he went to my
19:28grandfather's house where we just
19:29happened to be
19:30and so we just hung out with george bush
19:32for about an hour in my
19:34grandfather's backyard while he was the
19:36president
19:37um so yeah it's definitely had some
19:39unique experiences
19:40yeah so that's worth taking a second to
19:43explain with your grandfather
19:44yeah yeah and then yeah so then he
19:47joined the board of theranos and
19:49when he joined he also brought a lot of
19:51his his friends over so he
19:53he brought over um people like jim
19:55mattis who was the soon-to-be
19:57secretary of defense uh henry kissinger
20:00another former secretary
20:02of state um and a hand a handful of
20:05others
20:06as well so basically when you brought up
20:09your concerns in a very factual
20:11non-aggressive way to elizabeth you got
20:14an answer from
20:15um sunny was the the president of the
20:18company saying
20:20if you were not who you are we we would
20:22have smashed you
20:24something like that yeah but he was very
20:26vague about it he said
20:28would have been held accountable in the
20:29strongest way
20:31which is like does that mean fired or
20:33does that mean something worse
20:35i don't know but you kind of get a sense
20:37of what it meant
20:38when you answered to him and what did
20:41you answer
20:43uh so i just said consider this my two
20:45weeks notice
20:46um if you prefer i leave today that's
20:48fine with me as well
20:50and unsurprisingly they preferred that i
20:52left that day
20:53so yeah so that was the
20:57the end of your work experience so you
20:59worked there for eight months and
21:01you work a lot you work night shifts and
21:04you
21:05yeah i work around the clock often
21:08um actually there's one more detail that
21:11i think is pretty important to our
21:12conversation and that is
21:14that i actually reached out to the new
21:16york state department of health
21:17yes about one of my concerns and when i
21:21did that
21:21i was you know i knew how seriously
21:24theranos took all their their secrets
21:26so i did not want that to be traced back
21:28to me
21:29um so i made up a fake email account and
21:32i contacted new york state department of
21:34health and i didn't even tell them where
21:35i worked i didn't tell them what tests
21:37we were running i was
21:38very very vague i just said that these
21:40were i just described the processes
21:42that had taken place and they responded
21:46and said this is a form
21:47this is a violation of our of our
21:49regulations it's a form of cheating on
21:51that audit that i
21:52i previously described and they asked
21:55for the name of the company so that they
21:56could reach out to them to improve
21:58their practices and i asked if i could
22:01do that anonymously
22:02and they said only if i reported it to
22:04what they called the laboratory
22:06investigative unit
22:07um and so they gave me that email and so
22:10i a non
22:11i'm anonymously with a fake email um
22:15so my my fake alias was anonymous i
22:19emailed this laboratory investigative
22:21unit and
22:22i never heard back yeah and
22:26years later john kerry who i'm sure we
22:29are going to talk about here pretty soon
22:31um followed up with them and he says
22:34that essentially what happened was
22:35they thought that this was a federal um
22:39like a federal matter not a new york
22:41state matter
22:42and so they forwarded the complaint to
22:44the center of medicare and medicaid
22:46services so cms
22:48is the overarching regulatory bottle for
22:51uh body for
22:52central laboratories and cms says that
22:55they
22:56never received the complaint so
22:58laboratory investigating
22:59unit says they send it to cms cms says
23:01they never saw it
23:04so yeah let's go back to the failure of
23:07regulators
23:08later but let's let's move on so you you
23:11quit sternos
23:12uh in april 2014 then
23:16things go okay for a while
23:20for a while until i have thanksgiving
23:22dinner with her after that
23:24yeah um awkward
23:27mommy a little bit awkward yeah and then
23:32then when did so you have a new job
23:36you're happy you have a good life thanos
23:39is behind you just this
23:40awkward relationship with elizabeth and
23:42your grandfather
23:44but no crisis
23:47and then what what's happened yeah so i
23:50thought fairness was completely behind
23:52me
23:53um and then john kerry reached out to me
23:57on linkedin
23:58um and he just after you checked his
24:01profile he saw that yeah so the slightly
24:03longer story
24:05yeah that is that john reached out to a
24:08few other
24:08theranos former theranos employees who
24:10told me they
24:11said oh look this investigative
24:13journalist is reaching out to me about
24:14their nose
24:15so then i looked at his linkedin page
24:17just to kind of see what his background
24:18was
24:19he saw that i looked at his linkedin
24:20page and then messaged me
24:23um and i ignored him for about a month i
24:26talked to
24:27um one of my former managers at theranos
24:29about it i talked to my parents about it
24:31everyone said don't talk to him you're
24:34only going to create a whole lot of
24:35trouble for yourself stay out of it move
24:37on with your life
24:38and so i tried to do that for about a
24:40month but i had
24:41i just every single day i was thinking
24:43about what he knew
24:45what the angle of the story was and if
24:47there was basically a way that i could
24:49help
24:49and it just i tried so hard to not talk
24:52to him but it was like a compulsion i
24:53just had to
24:55so eventually i bought a burner phone
24:57with cash
24:58and i called him and i was surprised at
25:02how open he was with me about what he
25:04knew
25:05because up up until that point every
25:07time i talked about theranos with
25:08someone we would
25:09literally be checking our shoulders to
25:10see who would be listening everyone was
25:12very very guarded and he just kind of
25:15laid out all of these problems that i
25:17i've already kind of laid out here and
25:20he said that
25:22he had a source that was well above my
25:24pay grade
25:25and he was really looking for
25:27corroborating sources
25:29and in that call i told him that my
25:31grandfather was part of the nixon
25:33administration during watergate
25:35part of the reagan administration during
25:36the iran contra scandal
25:38and made it out of both of those with
25:40his integrity completely intact
25:42so i was sure that if he was given the
25:44opportunity that he would make things
25:46right with the people that elizabeth has
25:47hurt
25:48and i would want the truth about
25:49theranos to come out sooner rather than
25:51later so i agreed to be a deep
25:53background source for his reporting
25:55yeah so he explained to you okay you
25:57could be of the record
25:58on background or on the record and you
26:01agreed to be
26:02on background right i agreed to be
26:04background yeah
26:07um at that moment and then
26:12things start to go bad
26:16sideways yeah i thought that i would be
26:18i thought that i could stay anonymous
26:20forever i thought oh burner phone with
26:21cash no one can ever figure out that
26:24that i i spoke to him so then
26:27you said that basically when you talked
26:29to john he was pretty advanced in his
26:31own investigations
26:33so quickly after that he sent question
26:36to
26:37tejanos yeah so i ended up
26:40forwarding him the email exchange that i
26:43had with elizabeth and sunny
26:46and he used one number from that email
26:48to probe theranos he said
26:51like one of my sources said that for tsh
26:53the coefficient of variation is as high
26:55as 42.9 percent
26:57and they saw that 42.9 and said that
27:00came from tyler schultz
27:02and uh so i i ended up actually going
27:06home to have dinner with my parents one
27:07night and my dad had just gone off the
27:09phone with my grandfather and he said
27:11that
27:11theronos knows that i was speaking to
27:13the wall street journal
27:15and i said there's no way they actually
27:16know this is a real reporter
27:18i did my research on him
27:22and he had actually won a pulitzer prize
27:25before so this was not like uh and he
27:28investigated health care
27:30and he got an impact from his
27:32investigations so yeah you're trying
27:34right
27:35i i didn't just willingly pick up the
27:37phone and start blabbing about their
27:39nose i made sure that it was somebody
27:41who
27:41would actually be responsible with the
27:43information beforehand
27:44so i told my parents there's no way they
27:46actually know there's no way the
27:47reporter just gave me up like that
27:49there's just no way
27:51so i uh i ended up calling my
27:53grandfather and and he
27:55he said that um in order to protect
27:57their trade secrets theranos needed me
27:59to sign a one-page non-disclosure
28:01agreement
28:03uh which sounded kind of weird but i
28:04said sure that's fine with me
28:07but before i talk to the fairness
28:09lawyers tomorrow morning can i just come
28:10over to your house and talk to you
28:12tonight and he said yeah sure no problem
28:16so i went over to his house i rehashed
28:18all my old conversations with him
28:20he said that elizabeth assured him that
28:22they were going above and beyond what
28:24was required of them from the fda
28:26and and that he spoke to surgeons who
28:29said it was it would revolutionize the
28:31field of surgery and
28:32that these devices were already being
28:34used in medevac helicopters and they're
28:36already being used
28:38in operating rooms at ucsf and so the
28:41difference in reality was just so
28:44large that there was no way we were
28:45going to find common ground
28:47and he said well whatever the case may
28:48be well you sign a one-page
28:50non-disclosure agreement
28:52and i said yes i have no problem signing
28:54that and so he said
28:55well actually there's two lawyers here
28:57right now can i go get them
28:59and i was completely blindsided by that
29:01he went and got the lawyers
29:03and they did not give me a one-page
29:05non-disclosure agreement they gave me a
29:07notice to appear in court on friday
29:09morning
29:10and this was a wednesday night they gave
29:12me a an application for a temporary
29:14restraining order
29:16and they gave me a strongly worded
29:18letter signed by david boyce
29:20who i did not know at the time
29:23and so that's kind of surprised your
29:25grandfather and at that moment he kind
29:27of went on your side by saying hey
29:29that's not what
29:30we talked about yeah so i argued with
29:33their lawyers for a long time
29:34and then eventually my grandfather got
29:36frustrated and kind of kicked them out
29:37of the house
29:38and then we called elizabeth and he said
29:41we were trying to have a discussion you
29:42sent over our litigator
29:44tomorrow i want you to send different
29:46lawyers and i want you to send a
29:47non-paid the one-page non-disclosure
29:49agreement like we had discussed
29:52but of course the next day comes and the
29:54same two lawyers come over to his house
29:56they bring an affidavit not a
29:58non-disclosure agreement
29:59which essentially says my name is tyler
30:01schultz i'm 24 years old
30:03i have not spoken to the wall street
30:04journal but here's a list of names of
30:06people who i know have
30:08and i was i was adamant with them at
30:10that point that i had not spoken to the
30:11wall street journal i
30:13i did not want to tell them that yeah
30:15and so we ended up bickering over that
30:17for a while
30:18um i ended up not signing it and i to
30:21make a long story a little bit shorter i
30:23ended up
30:24getting connected with a legal team and
30:27for probably about four months it seemed
30:30like
30:30within two or three or four days we were
30:33going to be in a courtroom battle with
30:35their nose
30:36and theranos hired private investigators
30:39to follow me
30:40and my legal team and they hired uh
30:44this lawyer david boyce and that that's
30:48maybe worth explaining why it was such a
30:50big warning sign when you tell any
30:52lawyer that that's the lawyer on the
30:54other side
30:56yeah so um when i'm given that first
30:59affidavit i eventually just said you
31:01know
31:02elizabeth has had lawyers look at this
31:04with her best interests in mind so now i
31:06want to have a lawyer look at this with
31:07my best interest in mind
31:09and my grandfather was very frustrated
31:11and said okay
31:12and so he said if his personal attorney
31:15said it was okay to sign would i sign it
31:17i said sure
31:18so he went to go fax the affidavit and i
31:21went outside and i called
31:22his lawyer and i said my grandfather's
31:25about to send you something and he's
31:26going to tell you to tell me that i have
31:27to sign it
31:28but you have to tell him that i cannot
31:30sign it he's just kind of like
31:32whoa whoa okay uh slow down
31:36who's representing them and i said
31:38someone named david
31:39boyas and he just went holy
31:43[ __ ] do you know who that is
31:46and he described how he um has been
31:49involved in so many high-profile cases
31:51like
31:52uh gore v bush napster versus the
31:55the u.s government um he
32:01yeah harvey one scene and he was
32:02involved in hiring private investigators
32:04to follow around the women
32:06involved in that story um now he's
32:09representing jeffrey epstein's victims
32:12which is
32:13the other side of the coin harvey
32:14weinstein epstein's victims
32:16but basically he's known to be a
32:18corporate gun or something like that
32:20yeah he's i was told that he's known as
32:23the number one corporate gun
32:25in america
32:28so as soon as your family lawyer here
32:31his name is like okay
32:32come to my office we need to to do
32:35proper legal work
32:37right so then i i went and told the
32:39fairness lawyers
32:40i i said this lawyer says i need to go
32:42to san francisco to to talk with him and
32:44i was in palo alto just
32:45like 45 minutes away and they said okay
32:48you can go consult with this lawyer but
32:49you need to be back here
32:51at two o'clock you need to be back here
32:53at two o'clock
32:54and i said yes i will be back here at
32:55two o'clock and i went and i met with
32:57this lawyer
32:58and he's he just goes there's no way
33:00you're gonna go meet with them at two
33:02o'clock
33:03there's no chance and basically that was
33:05this first day
33:07of months of legal
33:10hell yeah so being threatened
33:14to go to court any time pressure
33:17you you were tipped that you were
33:19followed
33:21uh you could not talk to your parents
33:23about what was going on
33:24you were you had many legal teams you
33:28were spending a fortune on lawyers
33:31yeah i i was um yeah so i went to bed
33:35that first night with a notice to appear
33:37in court the following morning
33:39and when i woke up i luckily had an
33:41email from the fairness lawyers saying
33:42that they would give me more time to
33:44negotiate
33:45and that started this cycle of we're
33:47going to court and i would think all
33:49right we're going to court and then they
33:50would say we're going to give you more
33:51time to negotiate and it was just like
33:53that
33:54on cycle for months
33:57um and so yeah i ended up racking up
34:00hundreds of thousands of dollars in
34:02legal fees my parents
34:04said that if we did end up going to
34:06court that they would
34:08have to sell their house to pay for my
34:09legal fees but that that
34:11but they were totally willing to do that
34:14but they begged me
34:15not to make them do that they just said
34:17sign whatever it is they're asking you
34:19to sign this is not your battle
34:21and essentially i just i said that i was
34:25not going to sign the affidavits that
34:27theranos was pressuring me to sign
34:29because i wasn't going to sign something
34:32under penalty of perjury that i knew was
34:34not true
34:35and i'm not allowed to say exactly what
34:37was in those affidavits
34:39but that's just of it is i wasn't gonna
34:42say something that was not true
34:43under penalty of burglary and they were
34:45asking me to say things that i did not
34:47believe were true
34:49so awful or full summer
34:52and then the article comes out
34:56yeah so finally the wall street journal
34:58article comes out
35:00and i've just been waiting and waiting
35:01and waiting for it
35:03um as as it comes close to publication i
35:07think a lot of the pressure is relieved
35:09off of me
35:10and fairness kind of realizes that they
35:11have bigger problems than me
35:14that becomes especially true after the
35:16article comes out
35:17but even after that article came out
35:19they did not go down they
35:21they went down swinging so but first
35:25the arctic so you you're scared and i'm
35:28at the same time excited to know the
35:29articles comes out and what's your
35:31reaction what do you think when the
35:32articles comes up
35:34yeah so my initial reaction and i've
35:37actually not talked to john about this
35:38i'm curious what
35:40he would say but my initial reaction was
35:42that the first
35:43article was was pretty weak because i
35:46knew
35:47that john had way more information than
35:50what appeared in that first article
35:52and when i read it i was terrified
35:54because i thought
35:55what is in this article is not going to
35:57bring theranos down
35:58they're going to recover and when they
36:00do they're going to
36:02destroy me they are going to you know
36:04it's interesting because
36:05most of the whistleblower i worked
36:08around the
36:08investigation i can feel that they're a
36:11little disappointed when
36:13sometimes the articles comes out because
36:14they feel like come on you know much
36:16more why didn't you put it out there
36:19yeah generally they're happy because
36:21also it's a fair
36:22portrait but right yeah so
36:26just to the side notes but what i didn't
36:28quite realize was that
36:29john had articles that were already
36:32planned and in the works and it was an
36:34ongoing story i for some reason in my
36:36mind i thought it was there was going to
36:37be one article and then it was going to
36:39be done
36:40and he had also probably his own legal
36:43restraint
36:44and yeah i'm sure he did i'm sure he did
36:47um but over the course of the correction
36:50was not the right one in a sense because
36:52then
36:52a lot of other articles came out and
36:55other
36:56media picked up yeah and it just got
37:00worse
37:00and worse and worse and for a while
37:04i think theranos was threatening to like
37:06sue the wall street journal they were
37:07sending them cease and desist letters
37:09they were fighting every article that
37:10came out
37:11and eventually i think they just kind of
37:14gave in they stopped sending those to
37:15the wall street journal and
37:18but also because the regulators woke up
37:21yeah yeah so they ended up being
37:24investigated by
37:26the fda and the center for medicare and
37:29medicaid services and they ended up
37:30saying that
37:31um theranos had practices that
37:34jeopardized
37:35patients health so they weren't allowed
37:37to run a lab for two years
37:38something like that then the sec ended
37:41up investigating and said that thanos
37:43was guilty of a massive years-long fraud
37:45prevented her from running a publicly
37:47traded company for 10 years
37:49gave her a little fine um and
37:53the department of justice has also been
37:55investigating and that is still an
37:56ongoing matter
37:57so it's i mean to this day it's actually
38:00still a developing story
38:02yeah and actually i found it fascinating
38:06that
38:07you said in your podcast that then
38:10you've you considered that your decision
38:13to speak
38:13on the record was one of the best
38:16decision you
38:17you took and i found it fascinating and
38:19i'm even
38:20wondering and you also said that you
38:22don't have any regret
38:23going through all that i'm i'm actually
38:26wondering don't you regret
38:27that you should have speak on the record
38:30earlier
38:33um sorry i think i went
38:36on the record at the right time going on
38:39the record earlier for me i think would
38:41have just made
38:42it so much worse i think it would have
38:45been
38:46even more of a disaster i think if i
38:47went on the record from the
38:49very get-go i think fairness would have
38:51sued me i think i would have spent
38:53two million dollars in a courtroom
38:55instead of a few hundred thousand
38:57staying out of a courtroom
38:59i really do believe that but why do you
39:02believe it was the best decision of your
39:04life one of the best to speak on the
39:07record
39:08i think it was one of the best because i
39:10was so incredibly
39:12stressed and depressed and angry and
39:15even after the wall street journal came
39:17out with their first article
39:19in october 2015 so
39:22a year after the wall street journal
39:25article
39:25first came out my grandfather was still
39:27on the board the board released a
39:29statement saying that it had
39:30that elizabeth had their full support um
39:34and i felt like they were still pushing
39:36me around so i learned
39:39so about a after not talking to john for
39:42about a year
39:43he came to the stanford university
39:45campus where i was working at the time
39:47and i ended up going to meet up with him
39:50and
39:51a couple days later the theronos lawyers
39:53told me that they were aware that i was
39:54meeting with the wall street journal
39:56reporter again
39:57so to me that meant that oh after
40:01over a year they still had private
40:03investigators either following me
40:05or following john they had some source
40:07that was keeping tabs on us
40:08and that just pissed me off to be frank
40:11um i felt like i had been proven to be
40:13right and the fact that they were still
40:15bullying me
40:16just pissed me off and i felt i hadn't
40:18told the story
40:20of the the lawyers hiding in my
40:22grandfather's
40:23yeah and i felt like i had this great
40:26story that they should they should be
40:28terrified of me they should be
40:29respecting
40:30they should be respecting me i've been
40:31proven to be right and they weren't they
40:32kept pushing me around
40:34and so eventually i just felt like why
40:37am i the one who
40:38feels like they need to hide theranos
40:39needs to hide
40:41and i'm i'm not ashamed of anything that
40:44i've done
40:45i everything that i've done i'm happy
40:46for that to be public
40:48so i'm going on the record with
40:50everything that i've done i'm gonna put
40:51my name to this story
40:53and i'm gonna stand up for myself i'm
40:55not gonna hide anymore
40:56and after i did that it was a it was
40:59just a huge relief
41:01so when was the article
41:04published with you on the record uh
41:08i went on the record that was uh
41:11november 16th 2016. so one year
41:14after the first article published by a
41:17little more after
41:18a little longer than one year and part
41:20of the reason i did that also was
41:22because my grandfather was on the board
41:25and
41:26i thought that's fine like if he wants
41:28to make the decision to support them
41:30that's i came to terms with that i said
41:32that's fine with me that he's made that
41:34choice
41:35but i'm going to make him do it publicly
41:37so
41:38that was part of my my reasoning and
41:41once i went on the record he did resign
41:43from the board
41:45and then david boyce also resigned and
41:47that kind of opened the door
41:48like the floodgates for their whole
41:50board kind of resigning
41:52so basically the the you talking on the
41:55record
41:55is kind of the beginning of the end of
41:57your trouble
41:59it really was yeah um
42:02i could finally tell my friends about
42:04what i was going through because
42:06i was supposed to keep all you know my
42:08legal troubles to myself not tell
42:10anybody about anything that was going on
42:12and i did that and so i wasn't talking
42:14to anybody so finally i could talk to my
42:16friends i could talk to my girlfriend
42:18talk to my parents more openly my
42:20siblings it was just a huge relief for
42:22me to not have to
42:24keep all this bottled up yeah
42:27and it was also that that moment that
42:30your grandfather had to resign
42:33and uh it's yours where you started
42:36slowly to
42:37speak again and that was also the way to
42:41to getting back together as a grandson
42:44and grandfather
42:46um but maybe let me i am
42:49i want to ask you what what did you
42:53learn from talking and working with
42:57a journalist like john and if you had
43:00any advice for other potential
43:04tech worker or who's thinking of maybe
43:08share some
43:09important information with the
43:11journalists
43:12what do you think they should know or
43:16yeah well i think the the big thing is
43:20um you have to be able to trust this
43:21person so you gotta do
43:23a lot of research and one of the things
43:25that that i did like i mentioned before
43:26i researched i read his past
43:28his past work i knew that he had won a
43:30pulitzer prize so i knew he was a
43:31serious reporter so
43:33when there came the time when i was kind
43:35of being told that the reporter kind of
43:37gave you up i knew that that couldn't
43:38have been true and so i
43:40i was con i was confident in my
43:42relationship with
43:43john kerry roo and i think it's
43:45important to have that
43:46so um and we had we had also met
43:50um beyond that first phone call he flew
43:52out to
43:54california and we had had met up over a
43:56beer
43:58um and so i didn't know him that well
44:00but i i knew him well enough to know
44:01that i could trust him that he wasn't
44:03going to just
44:04hand me over and then i think another
44:07thing is that you have to be confident
44:09that this reporter is going to
44:10going to see it through till the end
44:12yeah and what i didn't know at the time
44:15but learned later was that there was an
44:17enormous amount of pressure on the wall
44:18street journal to kill the story
44:21david boyce went over there they had
44:23very very long
44:25conversations where threatening them
44:28um right john described that in his book
44:31i remember
44:32yeah um there's some like little
44:35recordings of it show up in the
44:36documentary the inventor
44:38which is pretty enlightening to actually
44:40get to hear parts of those conversations
44:43um and then elizabeth so rupert murdoch
44:46who owns the wall street journal
44:48invested 125 million dollars
44:50in theranos and so elizabeth went to
44:53rupert murdoch
44:54i was told on multiple occasions and
44:57pleaded with him to kill the story
45:00um so there was a lot of pressure on
45:02john and for that newsroom to
45:04not publish this story and i'm very
45:07thankful
45:07that they fought like i thought to
45:10actually get it into print and
45:12they didn't they didn't want they didn't
45:13leave me hanging
45:15yeah yeah amazing uh crazy story so
45:20maybe um just before going to other
45:23questions like
45:24just what's the latest on the terran
45:28situation or trial where are we today
45:33um so elizabeth's criminal case
45:36um so that's being run by the department
45:39of justice
45:40has been postponed a number of times
45:43for fraud or fraud yeah i think i don't
45:46actually follow it as closely as i
45:48should but i think
45:49i think there's like 11 counts of fraud
45:54and the case against her is still
45:57ongoing
45:58it's still ongoing but it's scheduled
46:00for march
46:01and the company the company luckily shut
46:04its doors
46:05in i think late 2018 or maybe early 2019
46:09i can't exactly remember yeah it took so
46:11it took a while because they were able
46:14to get a new loan
46:16and to to spend millions of dollars
46:20yeah that's a part i often forget about
46:22that but after
46:23all this came out they still they got a
46:25hundred million dollar
46:26loan which is pretty astounding
46:29yeah so basically articles first
46:31articles come out
46:32uh october 2015 and it takes
46:37three more than three years to
46:39completely shut down with
46:40in the middle on a new big loan so yeah
46:42yeah and even longer than that
46:44for this criminal case to finally go to
46:46court
46:48and so you what are you doing now
46:51um well now i actually started my own
46:53little diagnostic startup which is
46:55pretty fun
46:57i left theranos i went and i started
46:59working in a lab at stanford that
47:01has essentially repurposed magnetic hard
47:03drive technology to do
47:04diagnostics okay so i ended up spinning
47:08out a little company with my professor
47:10trying to commercialize that technology
47:12and it's kind of funny because
47:15in a lot of ways it sounds very similar
47:16to theranos it's you can measure
47:18multiple things at the same time it's
47:19quantitative you can do it in point of
47:21care settings
47:22um but yeah elizabeth's told me so well
47:25on that vision that i'm still
47:27chasing after it but i'm using a real
47:29technology that has
47:31my professor has been publishing papers
47:33and filing patents for over 15 years on
47:35it so we have a really strong
47:37technology foundation and now it's it's
47:40a matter of
47:41of commercialization and taking it to
47:43the next level
47:45well i think that's that's fascinating
47:47that yeah you you were very excited
47:49about the mission
47:50and and believe that a
47:53revolution was needed in that sector and
47:55then you you worked very hard in the
47:57stanford labs to
47:59to try to make it happen and and now
48:02launching your startup so i think it's
48:04it's really commendable and i know well
48:08then quite the journey yeah
48:11but skipping and keeping on track um
48:14i i kind of want to to go back
48:18to because for me it's just so
48:22crazy i ca i still cannot believe and
48:25there's so many crazy things in this
48:27story
48:27but i in
48:31okay where do i start this point so
48:32what's crazy is how could
48:34uh terrano's machine end up in a
48:37walgreens which is basically a pharmacy
48:40for the european yeah
48:42how could a machine like that be in a
48:45public shop when the technology doesn't
48:49even work
48:50doesn't even exist so basically how
48:53could
48:53the regulator feel so
48:56so so so big
49:00and and basically i'm also asking that
49:03because
49:04it's linked to the question so then do
49:06you do the regulators
49:08change since tejanos could piranhas
49:12scandal happen again and basically i'm
49:15even more worried because we are in a
49:17covid
49:17uh pandemic crisis where there's
49:20definitely a rush
49:21for vaccines or treatments and so
49:25basically knowing that regulators could
49:27be so wrong
49:28and when we need some when we need quick
49:32solutions for the pandemic it kind of
49:35gets me worried
49:39good news on that side yeah uh so you
49:42you touched on a number of things there
49:43but one
49:44i want to make one thing really clear is
49:45that none of these devices
49:47ever made it into a walgreens store and
49:51thank you okay because you said your
49:54first day was the launch of the product
49:56in walgreens yeah that was part of the
49:58ruse is that they were supposedly going
50:00to be in these walgreens wellness
50:02centers and you could
50:03prick your finger it would go into the
50:04device and then you'd have the results
50:06by the time you walked out
50:07but in reality they were getting needles
50:09in their arms
50:10the blood was being drawn and then
50:11someone would drive it from walgreens to
50:14theranos and then we would do the
50:15testing
50:16at their nose so they never
50:19ever was one of these inside of a
50:21walgreens
50:22and in my opinion it would have been
50:25impossible
50:26to get them to work inside of a
50:28walgreens yeah okay didn't have the
50:30right type of equipment and
50:32so it was a fake launch it was a fake
50:35launch yes
50:36it was definitely a fake launch and on
50:37top of that when we launched we weren't
50:39even running the tests on the theranos
50:41platform we were just collecting at
50:42walgreens and then running on
50:43third-party equipment so they just they
50:45didn't really launch anything
50:47um but um on your other point
50:51i do so a lot of things had to go wrong
50:54in order for theranos to happen and if
50:56you think about all
51:00the executives failed the board members
51:02failed the investors failed the media
51:05failed
51:06so all of these systems that are
51:08supposed to keep
51:09the other systems in check they all
51:11failed
51:12and in some ways i feel like
51:15they failed so dramatically that there's
51:17no way it could ever happen again
51:19like there isn't going to be another
51:21company that's able to raise a billion
51:23dollars and not have a single investor
51:25on the board
51:26no one is going to be able to raise a
51:27billion dollars without a single
51:29investor
51:30ever seen an audited financial statement
51:32no investor is ever going to
51:34put together this board of directors
51:36that really doesn't have much control
51:38and doesn't
51:38know what they're doing um
51:42i hope you're right i
51:45yeah i hope i'm right too but since all
51:48the
51:49coveted stuff started happening my mind
51:51set has kind of started shifting a
51:53little bit
51:54and i've been seeing what's happening
51:55and it in a lot of ways it does feel
51:57like
51:58it's a really good time to commit fraud
52:00right now especially
52:02in okay
52:08have you been looking for a time to
52:10commit fraud now is the time to buy
52:13in um but it's just yeah with
52:16with regards to the to the diagnostics
52:19into the therapeutics
52:20into the vaccines there's just there's
52:22so much going on there's so much
52:24stimulus money out there
52:26i could see how it would be really easy
52:28for a company to fudge a little bit of
52:30data so they can get the next
52:32100 like 10 or 20 million dollar grant
52:35or whatever it is to continue that
52:36research
52:38um regulations are being dropped so that
52:41things can move faster we know that
52:43the regulations on the for from the fda
52:46for regulating the diagnostics
52:48have been kind of been going up and down
52:50initially they really
52:52lowered um regulations for things like
52:55the antibody tests
52:56and then the the market was flooded with
52:59bad tests and so then the
53:01the fda essentially took them all off
53:03the market and raised the bar a little
53:05bit
53:06and then i know that we've heard that
53:08the the president has been talking to
53:10the fda
53:11about lowering the standards for getting
53:14that vaccine through so that we can get
53:15vaccines faster
53:16so in science unfortunately things just
53:20take time and we're in a situation now
53:23where we need solutions fast
53:26yeah and so in order to get fast
53:28solutions you have to decrease
53:29regulation you have to kind of flood
53:31these markets with a lot of funding
53:34and a lot of funding lower regulations
53:38i think make for a dangerous recipe for
53:40for fraud
53:42but hopefully let's keep our eyes open
53:44and journalists out there please do your
53:46job yes more than ever because it's
53:50it's it's a very critical time so i
53:53think our times is running out um
53:56but i want to push you on that like
54:00what would you say to a friend who
54:04worked in a startup
54:05and was serious concerned about the the
54:08work he's doing what would you tell him
54:10to do
54:11um well one i would say so one thing
54:14that i did that i really recommend to
54:16other potential whistleblowers is find
54:19people who are
54:20senior to you who you can trust and for
54:23me i
54:24built strong relationships with a lot of
54:25senior scientists with my managers who
54:27are all seeing the same things that i
54:29was seeing
54:30and i could go to them and have very
54:31honest conversations
54:33and they could either confirm or help
54:36educate me but most of the time it was
54:38what you're seeing you know we're seeing
54:40too this is not how science is done
54:42and so i think it's important that you
54:44can be really confident in yourself
54:46before you go you know and into any kind
54:49of whistleblowing
54:50i would say also it's
54:53if you are a group of whistleblowers
54:56it's not
54:57then it's less about one individual or
54:59it's not about attacking one person but
55:02it's stronger if it's a group of people
55:04who are raising up
55:06issue as well yeah i think that would
55:08have been a great thing at their nose
55:10but
55:10everyone was so terrified there was such
55:13a strong culture of fear
55:15that i don't think we would have been
55:16able to pull together a group
55:18and as soon as elizabeth caught wind of
55:20a group getting pulled together
55:23we would have been in a courtroom so i
55:25think in some situations i'm sure that
55:27that can work out better in my situation
55:30i don't think it would have
55:31happened and i think it could have ended
55:33poorly um
55:35but then secondly actually i think
55:39knowing about resources like the signals
55:41network is super super important
55:44and when i was going through this you
55:46know i was like 22 23
55:4824 years old and i had no idea what i
55:52was doing i didn't even really see
55:53myself as a whistleblower i didn't quite
55:55frame it in that context
55:57and i went to i didn't know who to reach
56:00out to
56:01i didn't want i was too afraid to even
56:03really talk to lawyers
56:05and so now when you know a lot of people
56:08often reach out to me and say
56:09you know i'm seeing some shady things at
56:11my company can you help me out
56:14it's really nice for me to say hey
56:15contact the signals network because
56:18they can put you in touch with lawyers
56:20reporters
56:21um they can really just be they can i
56:24again these months i put in touch
56:26one with a lawyer yeah yeah great yeah
56:30i'm glad to hear that
56:31um and then i don't know because then
56:34they talk
56:35and they receive the legal advice and if
56:38they want to talk to another lawyer
56:39because for any reason i can
56:41find another lawyer yeah and
56:45what i didn't know is that there are a
56:46lot of very a lot of protected
56:48whistleblowing channels through the
56:50government that i didn't know about and
56:51if i had
56:52spoken to to someone like the signals
56:54network i'm sure i would have been
56:55educated on on options like that for me
56:58um so yeah so speak to a lawyer
57:02but a good one a lawyer yeah a one would
57:05not understand what's at stake and who
57:07knows the different whistleblowers low
57:09and right and it's different in every
57:12country
57:13it's also different in every every state
57:15in the us
57:17and so it's it's actually a very complex
57:20uh journey and so you better
57:24make some research uh on your computer
57:27at home
57:28not that word and um
57:31and and and connect with a trusted
57:34community of experts
57:36like the signals network but i would
57:39also encourage you to
57:40look at resources that um a group called
57:43government accountability project
57:46gap put out in the u.s for journalists
57:49and whistleblowers which are
57:51really great resources in each country
57:54it's different so
57:55in france for example i recommend to
57:57look at greenpeace resources
57:59that were put out to to explain how the
58:02law
58:03legislation is and protect with others
58:05in france
58:06for the eu there's a new directive
58:09uh which allow new protection for
58:12whistleblowers so i could refer you to
58:15some resources for journalists that
58:17explains um
58:18a little bit more about what it means
58:20for the journalists and their
58:22sources um so there are resources out
58:25there
58:25there are some good groups there's
58:27there's unfortunately not
58:29a lot of groups who really can put you
58:32in touch with a
58:34lawyer for free but um there is
58:37some so please uh please know that it
58:39exists through the signals network
58:41sometimes i connect you with
58:42other groups we work with in different
58:44countries
58:46but we are operational in 11 countries
58:49so far
58:51also we because it's such a complex
58:54legal word we're actually putting
58:56together and
58:57releasing in a few weeks a whistleblower
59:00index
59:01and the idea is to compare countries for
59:04the way
59:04they treat whistleblowers because i
59:06think there's a need to
59:08discuss more about the reality of
59:11the journalists sources and um and the i
59:14think the word we saw bloor still have a
59:16pretty pejorative like negative yeah
59:20aura and i hope uh people like you
59:23and many other can help change that
59:26person perception and
59:28wish that we could focus more on
59:32contribution you made basically you
59:34helped
59:35um stop a huge fraud who could have
59:39armed people and uh
59:42and and and that's really the case for
59:45most of the whistleblowers they they
59:46prevent major
59:48uh damage and harm so there should not
59:52be a any kind of negative aura around
59:55that
59:56um any last advice
1:00:00for someone
1:00:04you never think of becoming a
1:00:05whistleblower it's not like uh
1:00:07oh yeah i want to become a whistleblower
1:00:09it's it's a journey of trying to
1:00:11to to help your company in most of the
1:00:14case
1:00:15people want to honestly help their
1:00:17company do a better job
1:00:20to then go to the regulators or or to a
1:00:23journalist
1:00:24so i don't know i want to let you end
1:00:26this conversation with
1:00:28um an advise or optimistic note here
1:00:32yeah i mean i think what really worked
1:00:35out for me is that i
1:00:36end up i was very confident in myself
1:00:39and i and i trusted my gut and i never
1:00:41doubted myself and i think it would have
1:00:43been really tough
1:00:44if with when there was so much outside
1:00:47pressure if i began self
1:00:49self doubting that is when every i would
1:00:51have kind of collapsed
1:00:53so just you gotta trust your gut stick
1:00:55to your guns
1:00:57um and you'll be okay
1:01:00but thank you so much tyler and
1:01:03congratulations
1:01:04on your amazing journey and i wish you
1:01:07all the best for
1:01:08your new chapter and everybody you
1:01:11should absolutely listen to
1:01:13the podcast which is really really cool
1:01:16and it which was just released in august
1:01:17so it's very
1:01:19up to date if you have a four hours
1:01:21drive
1:01:22because it's it's three hours and a half
1:01:24uh please
1:01:25absolutely you should listen to to um
1:01:28tyler podcast which is on audible and uh
1:01:32thank you again and take care and i hope
1:01:35to
1:01:36see you soon in person yeah i hope so
1:01:38that'd be great
1:01:50bye-bye

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