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A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

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Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#121

Post by adrianN »

joncrocks wrote: post #35
adrianN wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Build a car that doesn't emit more than X of exhaust Y when a typical driver drives it a) ten kilometers in the city, b) a hundred kilometers on the highway." That seems like a good enough requirement to me. Define "a typical driver" as "out of a hundred random test drivers, no more than 20 exceed the thresholds, no more than 5 exceed the thresholds by more than a factor two." That forces the car manufacturers to ha…

So this is going to happen once they've built the car + engine, and started selling it? Is 'car tester' going to become a side-hustle? I agree that a degree of randomness is likely a good idea to avoid defeat devices, but one also has to consider that it could have two unintended consequences: 1) more expensive cars, due to more stringent QA procedures 2) relaxing of standards to ensure that companies can still pract…

"The average driver" is unlikely to change their driving style very quickly, so the tests would be reasonably reproducible from year to year.

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#122

Post by llukas »

unityByFreedom wrote: post #113
bicubic wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the interim, we can and should encourage people to be heroes. In reality it's just not black and white like that. I expect a lot of engineers aren't sure if they should be blowing the whistle about a particular thing. And they have no one to turn to for advice, especially not with the NDAs they will typically sign. So the position they'll find themselves is this: blow the whistle on a morally gray issue which ma…

> In reality it's just not black and white like that. I made it clear in the last paragraph it isn't black and white. Everyone has their own situation. I can still support people to come out before they actually do it.

If you're bit older than a graduate then you have much more to lose and nothing to gain. Mortgages, kids and ageism when looking for new job are not your allies.

So support - OK - support as in how? "like" on facebook? That is not enough to make it work.

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#123

Post by watwut »

vinceguidry wrote: post #18
mabbo wrote: post #9

While I certainly don't support the 'rogue engineer' excuse that VW originally gave everyone, the idea does bring up an interesting point. An engineer did write this code. Almost certainly, many of them, working together. Now, their managers told them it was okay to do this, maybe that legal had given the go-ahead or that they had to do it to keep their jobs... But it's still pretty clear that this was not right. The…

The problem with this is that it localizes the consequences of defiance on the weakest part of the chain, all but guaranteeing failure. You can't even expect engineers to blow the whistle on their soon-to-be-former employer. Ethics is about protecting the weak from the strong, not offering up the weak to get eaten by the strong. Only heroes put the good of the many over their own needs, and you can't expect everyone…

Every person on the chain has own ethical responsibilities. Both management and engineers. If you knowing participate on something like that, you share responsibility. I know that not participating has a cost and somethings it is too high. However, plenty of times it is not that high and you actually can get different job. Take people who write spyware or write fishy parts of Uber code (not everybody working there!) - they have a choice.

I guarantee you that there were some engineers who recognized situation and left or were let go sooner. It is not just magical heroes. Normal people, men and women take decisions of the "less cool company, less cool project but it is fishy here so I leave" normally. Maybe we should praise and celebrate this sort of decisions more instead of automatically considered them losers. As of now, engineers nor valley don't really value doing the right thing nor are willing to discuss what is the right thing - it values winners no matter what path they took.

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#124

Post by unityByFreedom »

llukas wrote: post #122
unityByFreedom wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In reality it's just not black and white like that. I made it clear in the last paragraph it isn't black and white. Everyone has their own situation. I can still support people to come out before they actually do it.

If you're bit older than a graduate then you have much more to lose and nothing to gain. Mortgages, kids and ageism when looking for new job are not your allies. So support - OK - support as in how? "like" on facebook? That is not enough to make it work.

Support as in donate to non profits that do this kind of work such as the ACLU, and suggest this opportunity to help to others.

Raising awareness can and does help make it work.

If you don't believe communication is effective then I don't know the point of this conversation.

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#125

Post by watwut »

mabbo wrote: post #9

While I certainly don't support the 'rogue engineer' excuse that VW originally gave everyone, the idea does bring up an interesting point. An engineer did write this code. Almost certainly, many of them, working together. Now, their managers told them it was okay to do this, maybe that legal had given the go-ahead or that they had to do it to keep their jobs... But it's still pretty clear that this was not right. The…

I agree. Engineers have the same ethical obligations as anyone else and that means you don't delegate your ethical decisions on management.

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#126

Post by stordoff »

tyingq wrote: post #3
Sniffnoy wrote: post #2

> The researchers also say that it’s high-time regulators dispense with the kind of lab tests that US and EU governments have required for years. Instead, some kind of active scan for illegal code needs to be developed. Alternatively, combine the lab tests with imprecise real-world tests as a sanity check, or keep the exact nature of the lab tests a secret and vary them over time. Really, the first of these seems lik…

The real world sanity checks for cheating make sense. But the nature of the regular tests can't be secret. Carmakers need to know the bar they are supposed to hit. Building something on the speculation that it might pass, maybe, is a whole different business model.

Would it be feasible to have two tests? One public, and one where the details are hidden. The hidden test has a significantly lower pass bar, so that the only way you would fail it whilst passing the public test is if you are manipulating the outcome of the public test.

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#127

Post by bryanrasmussen »

mabbo wrote: post #9

While I certainly don't support the 'rogue engineer' excuse that VW originally gave everyone, the idea does bring up an interesting point. An engineer did write this code. Almost certainly, many of them, working together. Now, their managers told them it was okay to do this, maybe that legal had given the go-ahead or that they had to do it to keep their jobs... But it's still pretty clear that this was not right. The…

It is true that people who are employed are obligated not to do unethical or criminal acts on the say so of their employer, but the employer is also obligated not to command their employees do unethical or criminal acts. And the employer is the one who holds the power in the relationship.

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#128

Post by fjdlwlv »

indolering wrote: post #76
mikeash wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how modern companies break the rules. Management doesn't break the rules, either overtly or covertly. Management scrupulously follows the rules, while placing requirements on their workers that can only be met by breaking the rules. Want your workers to work more, but you don't want to pay overtime, or you run into trouble with regulations about consecutive hours on the job? Just bump up how much work they ha…

This is also how we end up with "crazy" regulations. Case-in-point: nuclear waste handling. Engineers create complex six-sigma safety plans which are then slowly eroded as the regulations and safety protocols are wacky overkill, right? The WIPP nuclear isolation site had a 15 year run so management began to cut corners. Then three unlikely events all lined up and nearly got people killed. It started with a truck catc…

Seems like the "organic" fad was the problem

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#129

Post by semi-extrinsic »

unityByFreedom wrote: post #81
semi-extrinsic wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you describe already happens in the extremely-closed-source world of today. For most cars you can buy an ECU remap that can be switched from tuned to standard by the flick of a switch. An ECU is not actually that complicated. It reads a few tens of inputs (temperatures, air mass flow, lambda sensors, crank position, etc.), and controls a few tens of actuators (throttle body, fuel injectors, spark plugs, maybe va…

Crap. There will be more programmers in the future who will write defeat code for fun while learning, or pursue it as a business. That's obviously not great for the environment. Does anyone else feel our current government is not prepared to handle the changes pervasive software will create in the future?

If you think defeat code/devices are the worst of it, you've obviously not seen the people on YouTube "rolling coal"...

Re: A year of digging through code yields “smoking gun” on VW, Fiat diesel cheats

#130

Post by fjdlwlv »

briandear wrote: post #52
bosie wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know engineers were involved in writing the software? If there were engineers involved they should have said something if it does endanger the public. After all, it is in their responsibility/regulation to uphold the safety of the public.

Did it actually endanger the public? A silly question, however, what was the actual measurable consequence of this cheat? Did air quality become measurably worse during the period of this? Was anyone actually and measurably endangered? An older car on the road puts off more emissions than the modified VWs, yet older cars are still allowed on the roads. Laws should be followed, so I am not excusing the behavior, but m…

When the news originally hit, it was estimated that some number of air-quality related deaths were attributable to ait pollution contributions
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