The Whistleblower Protection Act (S. 372) is pending in the Senate and seeks to clarify the rules and protections that cover whistleblowers.

Some, however, think it will have the opposite effect, and it's drawing fire from some whistleblower groups.

March 9, 2010 (Politico). In a bid to secure a much-needed bipartisan victory, the Obama administration is trying to secure passage of protections for government whistleblowers. But some advocacy groups are complaining that the legislation does not go far enough to protect government employees in the national security field and, in fact, would roll back protections that FBI whistleblowers now have.

Since Birkenfeld approached U.S. authorities about UBS’s practices in 2007, seven former UBS clients, including a billionaire real-estate developer, have pleaded guilty. One, former Boeing Co. manager Roberto Cittadini, was sentenced today to six months of house arrest by a federal judge in Seattle.

Below is a summary of the cases against the bank, former UBS clients, and their enablers:

A campaign is building in the United States to defend Bradley Birkenfeld, the former employee of Swiss bank UBS who has started serving a 40-month prison term.

Birkenfeld blew the whistle on illegal practices by UBS, in which the bank helped Americans avoid paying taxes, but was himself sentenced after pleading guilty in 2008 to conspiring to defraud the US by helping a billionaire hide $200 million (SFr205.3 million) from tax authorities. 

January 19, 2010 (Washington Post) The FBI illegally collected more than 2,000 U.S. telephone call records between 2002 and 2006 by invoking terrorism emergencies that did not exist or simply persuading phone companies to provide records, according to internal bureau memos and interviews. FBI officials issued approvals after the fact to justify their actions.

E-mails obtained by The Washington Post detail how counterterrorism officials inside FBI headquarters did not follow their own procedures that were put in place to protect civil liberties. The stream of urgent requests for phone records also overwhelmed the FBI communications analysis unit with work that ultimately was not connected to imminent threats.

Jan. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Bradley Birkenfeld, a key informant in a U.S. investigation of offshore tax evasion aided by UBS AG, reported today to a federal prison in Pennsylvania to start a 40-month prison term that he denounced as unfair.

Former UBS AG private banker Bradley Birkenfeld, the key informant in the landmark U.S. case against the Swiss banking giant, reported to a federal prison in Pennsylvania Friday, while his lawyers stepped up their criticism of the U.S. Justice Department for prosecuting him.

MINERSVILLE, Pa. (AP) -- A former banker who provided key assistance in the U.S. tax evasion probe of Swiss banking giant UBS AG reported to prison Friday and said his cooperation should have earned him the federal government's gratitude, not time behind bars.

MINERSVILLE, Pennsylvania (Reuters) - Bradley Birkenfeld, the former UBS AG banker who became the whistleblower in the U.S. government's tax probe of the Swiss bank, on Friday began a 40-month prison term that he had sought to reduce and delay.