Federal appeals court upholds secrecy provision of whistleblower law

[JURIST] The US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit [official website] dismissed [opinion, PDF] a claim led by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) [advocacy website] upholding secrecy provisions of a federal whistleblower law. The case involved the Civil War-era False Claims Act (FCA) [text], which includes provisions authorizing private citizens, dubbed qui tam relators, to sue on behalf of the US accusing federal contractors of fraudulent claims against the government. The ACLU, together with the Government Accountability Project…