What should you say when asked about a former employee? For years, the stock advice has been: as little as possible -- just title and dates of service. But the legal picture is getting more complicated. On the one hand, 26 states have passed laws in the past four years that protect a reference-giver from liability for everything from defamation to fraud as long as true information was provided in "good faith." That would seem to mean less worry about speaking candidly. But state law can't protect you in the very cases where the issue of references most often comes up: federal suits that charge sex, race, age, or other discrimination. So most lawyers still advise giving only bare-bones data.

Even that rule may have an exception. In the last two years, a Florida judge and the California Supreme Court held that ex-employers may be liable for not giving a negative reference. The Florida case involved a former employee of Allstate Insurance Co., fired for bringing a gun to work. Allstate didn't tell the new employer, Fireman's Fund Insurance Co. -- and the man later shot three co-workers to death. In the California case, a school administrator's history of sexual misconduct wasn't disclosed to the district that hired him. So while you usually risk liability for saying too much, in the case of a dangerous ex-employee the danger may lie in saying too little.

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