????銀行會不會起訴彭博尚不清楚，但如果起訴，銀行方面將有充分的證據。《財富》也有一臺彭博終端，而我們跟彭博簽署的合同——它似乎適用于一般公司客戶——看起來在兩個地方給予其記者窺探我們的權利。這份合同在一個地方規定：“承租方（《財富》）認可并理解出租方（彭博）可能監控承租方對服務的一般使用情況，但僅限于設備運行方面的原因。”有人可能將這句話解讀為，彭博只能將那些信息用于確保終端正常工作。但彭博則可能認為，合同條款包含了提高其用戶“操作”體驗的任何事情。如果一篇關于你的尷尬報道提高了其他用戶的使用體驗，那彭博似乎脫不了干系。

????《財富》跟彭博的合同是在2003年簽訂的。據報道，一些銀行表示，其簽訂的合同似乎有保護用戶機密性的條款。但我們的合同里沒有。因此，要么是彭博更新了合同條款，要么是你們的律師比我們更優秀。

用戶會放棄彭博終端嗎？

????一般看法認為，彭博的31.5萬名用戶不會因為這次窺探丑聞而流失太多。不過，這種看法似乎假定華爾街的每個人做的是同一種工作。

????舉例來說，交易員無法離開彭博終端及其即時查看新聞、股市和債券市場價格的功能。但對企業并購銀行家來說，在辦公桌上擺一臺彭博終端更多的是一種地位象征，而不是你真正需要的東西。銀行家們或許會從彭博終端上獲取信息，但他們進行交易所做的分析大多是在Excel電子表格上進行。另外，這些企業并購銀行家對于被追蹤的態度可能是最為偏執的。特定行業的知名銀行家可能不會希望其他人知道自己在周日或者尤其是長周末后的周一身在辦公室（周末放假時還在辦公室是進行交易的信號）。而且不要忘了，這件事發生在華爾街尋求削減開支的時候。一臺彭博終端的使用年費大概是2萬美元，因此，雖然沒有大銀行打算因為這件事或其他任何記者違規訪問數據的行為而完全放棄使用彭博終端，但那并不意味著沒有人會放棄。

彭博記者窺探過其他記者嗎？

????這就到了整件事中最重要的一個問題：彭博記者窺探過我或者其他記者嗎？或許吧，那是有可能的。《紐約時報》擁有7臺彭博終端，但一位發言人表示，其中沒有一臺是登記在個別記者的名下，它們是由新聞編輯部成員共享的。彭博終端在道瓊斯公司（Dow Jones）更加稀缺，《華爾街日報》（The Wall Street Journal）記者無法使用那些機器。但《巴倫周刊》（Barron）有一臺，《金融時報》（The Financial Times）則有一堆，但該報發言人沒有回應到底有多少臺。

????幾年前，《財富》圖書管理員一時較起勁，她向彭博一位客服人員詢問記者們是否能夠看到她所查詢的問題。對方的回答含糊其辭，令她一直困惑不解。不過，《財富》內部沒有人記得自己在彭博終端上查詢時導致該社窺探我們的事情。在報道摩根大通（JPMorgan）“倫敦鯨”事件方面，彭博確實擊敗了《華爾街日報》，盡管大多數人似乎將獨家報道的功勞記到了后者頭上。但由于《華爾街日報》沒有彭博終端，我們很難將這件事跟目前的窺探丑聞聯系在一起。

????更重要的是，彭博擁有一項政策，即限制其所認定的媒體直接競爭對手使用彭博終端。所以，如果真有使用彭博終端窺探其他記者的策略，這可是自相矛盾。（財富中文網）

????譯者：王燦均

????It's not clear they can sue, but if they do they will have a good case. Fortune has a Bloomberg terminal. And it looks like the contract we signed with Bloomberg, which appears to be the generic one used by the company, gives its employees the right to spy on us in two places. In one place, the contract states, "Lessee [Fortune] acknowledges and understand that Lessor [Bloomberg] may monitor, solely for operational reasons, Lessee's general use of the Service." One could interpret that to mean Bloomberg could only use the information to make sure the unit was operating properly. But Bloomberg could argue that the statement referred to anything that improved its users' "operational" experience. And if a particularly embarrassing story about you improved other users' experience that day, then Bloomberg seems to be covered.

????Fortune's contract was signed back in 2003. Reportedly some banks said that their contracts seem to protect the users' confidentiality. But that's not in our contract. So either Bloomberg has updated its contract, or your lawyers are better than our lawyers.

Will clients flee Bloomberg?

????So the general wisdom is that Bloomberg won't lose many of its 315,000 customers from this spying scandal. But that seems to assume that everyone on Wall Street does the same job.

????Traders for example probably couldn't live without a Bloomberg, and its immediate access to news and stock and bond market prices. But for mergers and acquisitions bankers, having a Bloomberg on your desk is more a status thing than something you really need. Bankers may get info from Bloomberg, but most of the analytics they run on deals happen on Excel spreadsheets. M&A guys are also probably the most paranoid about being tracked. A prominent banker in a particular industry might not want others to know he is in the office on Sunday or especially a Monday of a long weekend. (Being in the office on a holiday weekend is a telltale sign of a deal.) And remember this comes at a time when Wall Street is already looking to cut costs. Bloomberg terminals cost about $20,000 each. So while no big bank is going to completely ditch Bloomberg over this or any other breach of data to reporters, that doesn't mean no Bloomberg terminals are going to go dark.

Did Bloomberg reporters spy on other reporters?

????So here's the most important question in the whole affair: Did Bloomberg reporters use their snooping function to spy on me, or other reporters? Perhaps. It's possible. The New York Timeshas seven machines. But a spokesperson says that none of the machines is registered to an individual reporter. They are shared by the newsroom. Bloombergs are more scarce at Dow Jones. The Wall Street Journal reporters don't have access to Bloomberg machines. But Barron'shas one. The Financial Times has a bunch of Bloombergs, but a FT spokesperson didn't get back in touch to say how many.

????A few years ago, Fortune's librarian in a moment of paranoia asked a Bloomberg help desk person whether reporters can access the questions she was asking. The answer she got back was vague and always left her wondering. But no one at Fortune remembers a time when a terminal inquiry led to Bloomberg scooping us on something. Bloomberg did beat the WSJ to theJPMorgan London Whale story, even though most people seem to credit the scoop to theWSJ. Although since the WSJ doesn't have Bloombergs, it's hard to connect that to the current snooping scandal.

????What's more, Bloomberg has a policy of withholding Bloombergs from media outlets that it considers direct competitors. So if using Bloomberg terminals to scoop other reporters was a strategy, it wasn't a coordinated effort.