Confidentiality of Professional Review
Class
http://proethica.org/ontology/intermediate#ConfidentialityofProfessionalReview
Class Hierarchy
- Thing
- ↳ entity (bfo)
- ↳ continuant (bfo)
- ↳ generically dependent continuant (bfo)
- ↳ information content entity (iao)
- ↳ directive information entity (iao)
- ↳ Principle (proethica-core)
- ↳ Relational Principle (proethica-intermediate)
- ↳ Confidentiality of Professional Review
Definition
Relational principle governing the obligations of a peer reviewer who has entered a contractual confidentiality agreement, requiring the reviewer to protect information obtained during the review from unauthorized disclosure while still fulfilling safety obligations.
Inherited from ConfidentialityPrinciple
Must be balanced against public safety obligations and legal disclosure requirements.
Case Provenance
Discovered in
This class was discovered during extraction of the case(s) above; the supporting verbatim quotes are in Source Evidence.
Properties
Abstract Nature
Requires balancing the contractual and ethical duty to protect client-commissioned review information against the obligation to notify the reviewed engineer and to act on safety findings.
Confidence
0.85
Derived Obligations
Decline engagements that require violating notification obligations as a condition of confidentiality
Distinguish between confidentiality of findings and concealment of the review's existence
Protect review findings from unauthorized third-party disclosure
Extensional Examples
Cases involving the tension between client-imposed confidentiality and professional notification obligations
NSPE BER Case 94-7 addressing confidentiality obligations of peer reviewers
Operationalization
Engineer B's contractual confidentiality obligation covers the contents and findings of the review but does not justify concealing the existence of the review from Engineer A, because that concealment would itself violate a separate professional obligation.
Potential Conflicts
Public Safety
Transparency
Principle Category
relational
Value Basis
Clients have legitimate interests in controlling sensitive professional review processes, but those interests do not extend to requiring reviewers to conceal the existence of a review from the engineer whose work is being reviewed.
Property Structure
1 · Object and Data Properties
rdfs:domain on this class or ancestor
| Property | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| establishedBy inherited | CodeProvision | Indicates which code provision establishes this ethical concept. |
| invokedBy inherited | Agent | Relates a Principle to the Agent(s) that invoke it in the case scenario (the parties who appeal to the principle to justify or evaluate conduct). May name several agents. |
2 · Definitional Attributes
SHACL definitional shape
| Attribute | Property (sh:path) | Description |
|---|---|---|
| principle kind | principleCategory | The controlled principle kind, which drives the four-kind subClassOf typing: FundamentalEthicalPrinciple, ProfessionalVirtuePrinciple, RelationalPrinciple, DomainSpecificPrinciple. The canonical leaf label becomes the rdf:type; the category is a routing input, not stored as a literal. |
| extensional cases | extensionalCases | Class-level prior cases that instantiate the principle (McLaren extensional grounding); an optional class-mint field. |
3 · Bearer Attributes
SHACL property shape
individual data
| Attribute | Property (sh:path) | Description |
|---|---|---|
| interpretation | interpretation | Per-case reading of what the principle requires in this situation (a defeasibility-pipeline source field). |
| concrete expression | concreteExpression | How the principle is concretely expressed in the case (a defeasibility-pipeline source field). |
| applied to | appliedTo | What the principle is applied to in the case (the situation or party it bears on). |
| balancing with | balancingWith | The competing principle or value this principle is balanced against in the case, recorded as a literal; extraction records the tension but asserts no defeat or precedence, and the defeasibility edges are materialized by a separate pass from this field. |
| tension resolution | tensionResolution | How the case resolves the tension involving this principle (a defeasibility-pipeline source field). |
| invoked by | invokedBy | The agent who invokes the principle, via the P->Agent invokedBy edge (resolved to a case Agent by embedding shortlist + LLM select; a Board-pattern invoking party resolves deterministically to the case-scoped NSPE Board of Ethical Review Agent). Range: Agent. |
4 · Referenced By
rdfs:range on this class or ancestor
| From | Property | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Action | guidedByPrinciple inherited | Relates an action to a principle that directs it. The principle supplies the value the action is taken to serve. |
| Code Provision | establishes inherited | Relates a code provision to the ethical concepts (principles, obligations, constraints) it establishes or defines. |
| Obligation | derivedFromPrinciple inherited | Relates an obligation to the principle or principles it operationalizes. The obligation gives concrete directive force to the more abstract value the principle expresses (Dennis et al. 2016). |
| Role | adheresToPrinciple inherited | Relates a role to principles that guide its conduct; the role-relative applicability edge of the R->P->O chain (the role determines which principles apply to conduct in that standing). |
Source Evidence
Text references
Engineer B objects to conducting the peer review without advising Engineer A
Owner instructs Engineer B to conduct the peer review without letting Engineer A know
Source text
Owner instructs Engineer B to conduct the peer review without letting Engineer A know
@prefix core: <http://proethica.org/ontology/core#> .
@prefix owl: <http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#> .
@prefix pcsh: <http://proethica.org/shapes/core#> .
@prefix proeth: <http://proethica.org/ontology/intermediate#> .
@prefix proeth-prov: <http://proethica.org/provenance#> .
@prefix prov: <http://www.w3.org/ns/prov#> .
@prefix rdfs: <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#> .
@prefix sh: <http://www.w3.org/ns/shacl#> .
@prefix skos: <http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#> .
@prefix xsd: <http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#> .
proeth:ConfidentialityofProfessionalReview a owl:Class ;
rdfs:label "Confidentiality of Professional Review" ;
proeth:abstractNature "Requires balancing the contractual and ethical duty to protect client-commissioned review information against the obligation to notify the reviewed engineer and to act on safety findings." ;
proeth:confidence "0.85" ;
proeth:derivedObligations "Decline engagements that require violating notification obligations as a condition of confidentiality",
"Distinguish between confidentiality of findings and concealment of the review's existence",
"Protect review findings from unauthorized third-party disclosure" ;
proeth:extensionalExamples "Cases involving the tension between client-imposed confidentiality and professional notification obligations",
"NSPE BER Case 94-7 addressing confidentiality obligations of peer reviewers" ;
proeth:operationalization "Engineer B's contractual confidentiality obligation covers the contents and findings of the review but does not justify concealing the existence of the review from Engineer A, because that concealment would itself violate a separate professional obligation." ;
proeth:potentialConflicts "Public Safety",
"Transparency" ;
proeth:principleCategory "relational" ;
proeth:textReferences "Engineer B objects to conducting the peer review without advising Engineer A",
"Owner instructs Engineer B to conduct the peer review without letting Engineer A know" ;
proeth:valueBasis "Clients have legitimate interests in controlling sensitive professional review processes, but those interests do not extend to requiring reviewers to conceal the existence of a review from the engineer whose work is being reviewed." ;
proeth-prov:discoveredInCase 15 ;
proeth-prov:discoveredInPass 2 ;
proeth-prov:discoveredInSection "facts" ;
proeth-prov:firstDiscoveredAt "2026-06-02T19:55:30.891672+00:00"^^xsd:dateTime ;
proeth-prov:firstDiscoveredInCase 15 ;
proeth-prov:matchConfidence 0.82 ;
proeth-prov:matchReasoning "The principle is a variant of the existing Confidentiality Principle, which is described as requiring balance against public safety obligations and legal disclosure requirements. The peer review context adds a specific dimension involving notification obligations to the reviewed engineer, but the underlying principle is the same Confidentiality Principle already in the ontology." ;
proeth-prov:matchedOntologyClass proeth:ConfidentialityPrinciple ;
proeth-prov:matchedOntologyLabel "Confidentiality Principle" ;
proeth-prov:matchesExisting true ;
proeth-prov:sourceText "Owner instructs Engineer B to conduct the peer review without letting Engineer A know" ;
rdfs:comment "Relational principle governing the obligations of a peer reviewer who has entered a contractual confidentiality agreement, requiring the reviewer to protect information obtained during the review from unauthorized disclosure while still fulfilling safety obligations." ;
rdfs:subClassOf proeth:RelationalPrinciple ;
skos:definition "Relational principle governing the obligations of a peer reviewer who has entered a contractual confidentiality agreement, requiring the reviewer to protect information obtained during the review from unauthorized disclosure while still fulfilling safety obligations." ;
skos:scopeNote "[ConfidentialityPrinciple] Must be balanced against public safety obligations and legal disclosure requirements." ;
prov:generatedAtTime "2026-06-02T19:55:30.891672+00:00"^^xsd:dateTime ;
prov:wasAttributedTo "Case 15 Extraction",
"claude-sonnet-4-6" .
pcsh:CaseAnnotationShape a sh:NodeShape ;
rdfs:label "Shared per-case annotation schema (all nine components)"@en ;
rdfs:comment "The cross-component annotation fields on committed case individuals: proeth:confidence (extraction confidence, decimal; all components except Action, whose Step-3 contract carries no confidence field), proeth:textReferences (verbatim supporting quotes, universal), proeth-prov sourceText (the source snippet, on the Step-1/2 provenance layers; Step-3 A/E individuals ground via textReferences only), and the involvement gloss (proeth:caseInvolvement on role individuals, proeth:caseContext on obligation, capability, and constraint individuals). Values are per-individual; the fields do not individuate any type."@en ;
sh:property [ sh:description "Extraction confidence for this individual (0 to 1)." ;
sh:name "confidence" ;
sh:order 1 ;
sh:path proeth:confidence ],
[ sh:description "Verbatim case quotes supporting this individual." ;
sh:name "text references" ;
sh:order 2 ;
sh:path proeth:textReferences ],
[ sh:description "How this individual figures in the case narrative (role individuals; the same text is routed into rdfs:comment)." ;
sh:name "case involvement" ;
sh:order 3 ;
sh:path proeth:caseInvolvement ],
[ sh:description "Grounding context in this case (obligation, capability, and constraint individuals)." ;
sh:name "case context" ;
sh:order 4 ;
sh:path proeth:caseContext ] ;
sh:targetClass core:Action,
core:Capability,
core:Constraint,
core:Event,
core:Obligation,
core:Principle,
core:Resource,
core:Role,
core:State .
pcsh:PrincipleDefinitionShape a sh:NodeShape ;
rdfs:label "Principle definition schema (type-level, descriptive, field contract)"@en ;
rdfs:comment "What individuates a principle TYPE: its canonical kind (drives the four-kind subClassOf typing; the canonical leaf becomes the rdf:type) and the extensional cases that ground it (McLaren). The five per-case narrative literals and the invokedBy edge are per-individual and now declared on PrinciplePropertyShape, mirroring the RoleDefinitionShape/ProfessionalRolePropertyShape split so the {{ principle_schema }} prompt separates the type judgment from what the case supplies. Descriptive only (no validation result); principle_category is a routing input, not stored as a literal."@en ;
sh:property [ sh:description "The controlled principle kind, which drives the four-kind subClassOf typing: FundamentalEthicalPrinciple, ProfessionalVirtuePrinciple, RelationalPrinciple, DomainSpecificPrinciple. The canonical leaf label becomes the rdf:type; the category is a routing input, not stored as a literal." ;
sh:name "principle kind" ;
sh:order 1 ;
sh:path proeth:principleCategory ],
[ sh:description "Class-level prior cases that instantiate the principle (McLaren extensional grounding); an optional class-mint field." ;
sh:name "extensional cases" ;
sh:order 2 ;
sh:path proeth:extensionalCases ] ;
sh:targetClass core:Principle .
pcsh:PrinciplePropertyShape a sh:NodeShape ;
rdfs:label "Principle per-case schema (individual data, non-definitional)"@en ;
rdfs:comment "What a principle INDIVIDUAL is described by in a specific case: the five narrative literals the defeasibility pipeline consumes and the agent that invokes it. These do NOT individuate the principle TYPE (that is PrincipleDefinitionShape); their values are per-case, asserted on the individual. Descriptive only."@en ;
sh:property [ sh:description "Per-case reading of what the principle requires in this situation (a defeasibility-pipeline source field)." ;
sh:name "interpretation" ;
sh:order 1 ;
sh:path proeth:interpretation ],
[ sh:description "How the principle is concretely expressed in the case (a defeasibility-pipeline source field)." ;
sh:name "concrete expression" ;
sh:order 2 ;
sh:path proeth:concreteExpression ],
[ sh:description "What the principle is applied to in the case (the situation or party it bears on)." ;
sh:name "applied to" ;
sh:order 3 ;
sh:path proeth:appliedTo ],
[ sh:description "The competing principle or value this principle is balanced against in the case, recorded as a literal; extraction records the tension but asserts no defeat or precedence, and the defeasibility edges are materialized by a separate pass from this field." ;
sh:name "balancing with" ;
sh:order 4 ;
sh:path proeth:balancingWith ],
[ sh:description "How the case resolves the tension involving this principle (a defeasibility-pipeline source field)." ;
sh:name "tension resolution" ;
sh:order 5 ;
sh:path proeth:tensionResolution ],
[ sh:description "The agent who invokes the principle, via the P->Agent invokedBy edge (resolved to a case Agent by embedding shortlist + LLM select; a Board-pattern invoking party resolves deterministically to the case-scoped NSPE Board of Ethical Review Agent). Range: Agent." ;
sh:name "invoked by" ;
sh:order 6 ;
sh:path core:invokedBy ] ;
sh:targetClass core:Principle .
Metadata
Extraction details
Discovered in case
15
Discovered in pass
2
Discovered in section
facts
First discovered
2026-06-02T19:55:30.891672+00:00
First case
15
Match Confidence
0.82
Match Reasoning
The principle is a variant of the existing Confidentiality Principle, which is described as requiring balance against public safety obligations and legal disclosure requirements. The peer review context adds a specific dimension involving notification obligations to the reviewed engineer, but the underlying principle is the same Confidentiality Principle already in the ontology.
Matched Ontology Label
Confidentiality Principle
Matches Existing
true
Generated
2026-06-02T19:55:30.891672+00:00
Attributed to
['Case 15 Extraction', 'claude-sonnet-4-6']