[quickthrowman]

I sell construction work. Sometimes my customers will have me price up something that someone else priced to them and they will send me a competitor’s redacted scope letter with the pricing blanked out so I can bid ‘apples to apples’ aka the same scope of work.

I’ve unredacted proposals using the ‘unflatten’ command in Bluebeam Revu (which is by far the best PDF editor) which allowed me to underbid my competitor and win the job (and at a higher price than I would’ve submitted).

Definitely an ethical grey area, but an edge is an edge ;)

[aeonik]

I really don't think this is grey, I think these cases have clear legal implications, though I'm not a lawyer. You are circumventing redaction, regardless of how boneheaded it is, the intent was clear.

I'd not do this if I were you.

[quickthrowman]

The information was in the document they sent me, they should’ve removed it completely if they didn’t want me to see it. The situation is identical to them mailing me a paper copy with a black piece of paper scotch taped over the price.

There are zero legal implications, it was a private contract. My customers regularly tell me the exact price that my competitors have submitted to them and that isn’t illegal.

Probably there are legal implications for attorneys circumventing redaction in legal documents but construction proposal letters have no protections against unredaction.

[dghlsakjg]

Morally gray, sure.

Legally, I can't see what's wrong with using information that you have, even if the other party didn't intend for you to have it. Lawyers themselves will use information in court that was accidentally sent to them by a counter-party, and that the other lawyer never intended them to have.

[Spooky23]

It may be technically an issue with some government bids, if you need to file an affidavit certifying you had no such knowledge.

But how would they prove it? And, doing so would reveal that they fucked up in the first place by sending it to you.

[IshKebab]

I would be really surprised if there was a law against this, and even if there was who really cares? As long as you don't make it super obvious (like consistently bid 1p under the competition) nobody will know.

[aprilthird2021]

There's no way there's a legal case that can be made against him imo