Using hacked information wrong? Not necessarily. How you use it may be.

It’s not the hacking that is inherently unethical, but what you do with it can be.

That’s the thrust of Kelly McBride’s post on Poynter.com, with North Koreas hacking and intimidation of Sony over “The Interview” movie the peg.

After all, the Pentagon Papers and the Nixon Watergate scandal came from sources that are not always in the mainstream. But national interests were at stake.

McBride wrote that, once you get the information by hacking or confidential informant or over the transom, the same rules apply:

Accuracy. Can you verify that the information is true?

Do additional reporting to verify the details. Repeating the information doesn’t absolve you of blame if it’s wrong.

Seek additional input or rebuttal from the relevant stakeholders. 

As a BJ editor, I told my reporters when they were working on an interview to talk to someone who doesn’t like that person because they’ll show you the other side of the story. And to check the disliker’s version with others.

You can read the entire article by clicking on http://www.poynter.org/news/308577/the-ethics-of-hacked-email-and-otherwise-ill-gotten-information/