Not OP but I had an experience like this recently. A toxic manager hated me and other employees, and wanted to fire me in the quickest way possible. He started

Not OP but I had an experience like this recently. A toxic manager hated me and other employees, and wanted to fire me in the quickest way possible. He started to give me tasks that were clearly illegal, like sending the passwords of the company by email to random people (contractors included which made it more obvious). I refused for two weeks while providing alternative solutions but this sociopath still was not happy. HR got involved somehow, but instead of siding with me, they told me in the nicest way that I would be a good employee if I obeyed and sent private data by email. It was obvious this time that they were building a case against me, because I knew what they were capable of. But younger me would have happily complied and break the law because, after all, HR is good for the employees and are not talking to the managers behind your back, right? So, the red flag is "when HR is nice to you." Never forget that they also obey the orders of the managers. Also they will happily forge emails to fire you. I’ve seen that more than once, and they’ll pretend it never happened. That’s why you must keep traces of email conversations if you feel something is wrong.