The first one is not really ambiguous: if you work at a hedge fund and received satellite images from your employer trading using this information is insider tr

The first one is not really ambiguous: if you work at a hedge fund and received satellite images from your employer trading using this information is insider trading because you were supposed to do your job and do it for your employer. If you are a day trader and bought the images yourself it's ok. I agree that the second one seems ambiguous and could certainly result in a lawsuit in the shareholders are unhappy. I don't think the third one is insider trading, the banker had a duty to keep this information confidential, not you and you did not colluded. This looks a bit like the loan to Kodak that got leaked in the press because they had forgot to embargoed it. While it certainly not good looking for employees of the company to trade on this information, what could possibly reproached to outsiders once this news is all over the Internet? Even after the initial tweet had been removed, the news was out their.