Has your company made you take a computer course in business integrity? If not, it probably will. It is mandated for many companies by a new federal law called the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which arose in response to recent financial scandals. The theory behind the Sarbanes-Oxley Act appears to be that because CEOs are crooked, you need ethics lessons.

I have just finished taking mine here at The Washington Post. I passed. I thought I would give you a quickie instructional course in how to pass this sort of test, too. It's actually pretty easy because most of the questions read something like this:

It is good to ...

A. Steal pocketbooks off co-workers' desks.

B. Steal pocketbooks off co-workers' desks but only if they belong to people you don't like.

C. Never steal anything.

D. Beat people up.

What pretty quickly becomes clear is that this is a course mandated by federal law, in the sense that it is 1) long, 2) silly and 3) uselessly generic. It seems to be applicable to all sorts of businesses, including those employing the recently incarcerated and the cognitively impaired. You are told, for example -- this is verbatim -- that the best way to make sure a laptop computer is not stolen is to bolt it to a larger object that is not customarily carried, such as a desk. You are also told that a smart way to remember your computer password is not to write it in enormous letters and tape it to your computer monitor.

In one hypothetical scenario, you are told that a co-worker, Linda, likes to talk loudly about sexual matters to a colleague, Jim, and that this annoys you and others in the vicinity. You are given several possible options for what to do about it, but none of them is perfect. The perfect answer, of course, would be for you and the others to wait for Linda and Jim to start talking dirty again and then begin to loudly pant and moan.

If in doubt, a good guide to follow on these quizzes is to invariably choose the really elaborate, goody-two-shoes, teacher's-pet answer. It will always be right. Example:

You smell alcohol on another employee's breath. The correct procedure is to ...

A. Say nothing. Being drunk at work is his business.

B. Throw water on him.

C. Threaten to kill his children unless he sobers up.

D. Report him immediately to a supervisor, since substance abuse in the workplace can result in slipshod performance and dangerous behavior, including running with scissors or taking out somebody's eye.

In fact, the best summary of this course is that, whatever happens, you must rat someone out. Time and again, you are told to tattle, and, at the end, you are actually given a phone number to call if you want to be an informant. It's called the Ethics Hotline.

Though the whole thing seemed pretty repugnant, it did occur to me that here was, at least, an opportunity to talk to a human being, to provide some sense of proportion. I decided to phone the Ethics Hotline with a true but trivial rat-out, something no one in his right mind would find to be unethical. A co-worker had printed out a single page of her daughter's grade-school homework because their printer at home was broken and the little girl was worried about getting the assignment in on time.

It turns out that the Ethics Hotline has been outsourced to a big national company created for this purpose (Sarbanes & Oxley Inc., I am guessing). I got a communications specialist named Sharon. The following conversation actually occurred.

Me: I would like to report a colleague. Her name is Beth Chang. She is a copy editor. She printed out a page of her daughter's spelling words, utilizing an office computer and printer. I did not personally witness this transgression, but she admitted it, personally, in my presence, expressing no remorse. I have her address and could probably obtain her Social Security number through subterfuge, if that is required. Her daughter's name is Sara. Sara is 7. I do not know if Sara was aware of the offense, but she probably is in possession of the document and might even be coerced into testifying against her mother in an appropriate tribunal.

Sharon: Has the employee done this before?

Me: Um, I don't know. I thought you would tell me if it was OK!

Sharon: I can't do that. I can only submit your complaint to the corporate offices.

Me: But ...

It was too late. A complaint was duly filed. To comply with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Sharon gave me a PIN and a tracking number, and thanked me for my cooperation, because employee informants "help maintain a fair and safe working environment."

Beth, clearly, is doomed. I just hope they don't come for Sara.