They may still become whistleblowers. Whistleblowers are only whistleblowers once they blow the whistle, before then they're thieves.

Some would like them to remain thieves after they've done their thing and I'm sure that some thieves eventually consider becoming whistleblower but in the interval between taking the data and exposing it there is no real difference that you could outwardly discern between the two cases.

Your comment implies that whistle-blowers are a sub-category of traitors. Is that intentional?

Is that what it implies? I would have missed that and read this as 'whistleblowers versus any kind of traitor'.

Your interpretation is what I meant.

I'm sorry about misinterpreting, it's just how I interpreted the comment. My bad.