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Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

blog.pragmaticengineer.com

221–230 of 369 posts

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a bit disingenuous to argue "they shouldn't get life without the possibility of parole" when in fact most of this economic white-collar crime goes completely unpunished, or at best gets a fine targeted at the company and never at the individual people who committed the crimes.

Most of these C-suite executives have more than enough money to retire comfortably.

Yep! So they need to go to jail, or the "punishment" is moot.

Obviously fining you 5$ for stealing 100 is not gonna work.

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a bit disingenuous to argue "they shouldn't get life without the possibility of parole" when in fact most of this economic white-collar crime goes completely unpunished, or at best gets a fine targeted at the company and never at the individual people who committed the crimes.

Most of these C-suite executives have more than enough money to retire comfortably.

This is more justification for banning people who got rich by doing illegal things from holding positions of power ever.

Not to punish per se, but to prevent them from doing more harm to the public.

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#223
post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on the country. It’s not possible to operate large companies in Hungary without paying to the prime minister’s family. When I lived there, I signed a paper at a large multinational company as a simple developer. The paper’s only purpose was to channel EU funds to the family. I was naive, and I thought that it’s a real project, with real work. It wasn’t. Later I realised why some of my coworkers were agains…

It's extremely fucked up that the EU has this kind of kleptocratic autocracy in its midst not only stealing billions but actively sabotaging its operations, when people have been warning about Hungary for 15 years (the Tavares report is from 2010 I believe).

It's funny seeing America, and making the same mistakes. We're humans after all.

The transition in Hungary was really seamless. Step-by-step. The Tavares report was still mainly about possibilities. The laws and the new constitution were already there to use them, but they still didn't use their full force. They could pretend that it's a democracy. They still pretend it, and most Hungarians still believe it, even when the government rules by decree for over a decade now, with elections with not equal playing field at all (opposition needs to win over 10% to be 50-50 with the ruling party).

And they're on the next phase. There is a new opposition leader, and it's way more difficult to pretend democracy now. The most interesting is Orban's used to be supporters. They switched like nothing. One day, an opposition adjacent podcaster was satan itself, the next day, "she's all right after all". One of my friend and his siblings argued against Orban with their parents for more than a decade, then the switch was instant. The parents will still choose badly next time, for the bad reasons, and they will allow to happen this again. When MAGA collapses, you can expect the same thing. There won't be any self reflection.

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#224
post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"permanently" "ever again" For good reason, modern law systems rarely issue punishments that last a lifetime. People can and do change, and something stupid (and illegal) you did 30 years ago shouldn't be held over your head today. These are rare cases for the absolutely worst crimes. For anything else, you receive a punishment, be it money or months/years in jail, and after that, you deserve a chance to live a life…

Being struck off by professional organisations is a thing, though. On the one hand I don't want the bar to this discipline raised. On the other hand, I don't want people like us (metaphorically) building bridges that tip every two hundredth car into the river.

Of course not. But 10 years later, rehabilitation could be in the cards?

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"permanently" "ever again" For good reason, modern law systems rarely issue punishments that last a lifetime. People can and do change, and something stupid (and illegal) you did 30 years ago shouldn't be held over your head today. These are rare cases for the absolutely worst crimes. For anything else, you receive a punishment, be it money or months/years in jail, and after that, you deserve a chance to live a life…

It's a bit disingenuous to argue "they shouldn't get life without the possibility of parole" when in fact most of this economic white-collar crime goes completely unpunished, or at best gets a fine targeted at the company and never at the individual people who committed the crimes.

To the contrary. I do find it a disingenuous argument to say "most of this kind of crime goes unpunished, so the cases we do punish, we have to punish for life".

The solution is not harder punishments for those that are punished, but punishing more of them.

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the 2010s, we had a similar situation but it wasn’t illegal. I used to work for a large drug distributor both pre and during the opioid epidemic. At the time (pre-SUPPORT Act), distributors weren’t required to notify the DEA about anomalous ordering so we didn’t provide data to law enforcement unless they sent a subpoena. To increase profits, we identified our best customers of opioids and updated our inventory tr…

How do you live with yourself?

How is it any different from working at a gambling company writing addictive software?

There will always be someone willing to do the work if the pay is good enough.

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think, for most people, getting the shit beaten out of them is a preferable outcome to losing their job. For most people, their job is the only thing standing between them and being homeless, losing their car, losing their kids, their partner, etc. This is why having a culture that treats firing people as no big deal leads to wack ass incentives. You can make people do almost anything if you threaten their job enou…

That may be true in the US, but very far from reality in countries that have universal healthcare and a strong social safety net.

That safety net does not extend to paying the interest on your house loan.

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#228
post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the very least, these folks need to have their names permanently attached to this atrocity. These weren’t decisions made by “a corporation” - these people sat across a meeting room table and actually concluded that targeting breast cancer patients was an acceptable means to an end. Lori A. Beer was the CIO at the time. Now at JP Morgan.

"permanently" "ever again" For good reason, modern law systems rarely issue punishments that last a lifetime. People can and do change, and something stupid (and illegal) you did 30 years ago shouldn't be held over your head today. These are rare cases for the absolutely worst crimes. For anything else, you receive a punishment, be it money or months/years in jail, and after that, you deserve a chance to live a life…

Punishment should match the crime, to both rehabilitate and be preventative.

White collar crime gets basically no punishment, and looking at career of those people they usually end up falling upwards.

For such cases banning them from being in a management position for X years would be a nice discouragement.

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you live with yourself?

How is it any different from working at a gambling company writing addictive software? There will always be someone willing to do the work if the pay is good enough.

It's a very smooth gradient from optimizing a sales funnel to writing gambling software. I don't know where the line is, but in both cases you're exploiting human psychology to make more money.

Re: Asked to do something illegal at work? Here's what these software engineers did

#230
post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the very least, these folks need to have their names permanently attached to this atrocity. These weren’t decisions made by “a corporation” - these people sat across a meeting room table and actually concluded that targeting breast cancer patients was an acceptable means to an end. Lori A. Beer was the CIO at the time. Now at JP Morgan.

"permanently" "ever again" For good reason, modern law systems rarely issue punishments that last a lifetime. People can and do change, and something stupid (and illegal) you did 30 years ago shouldn't be held over your head today. These are rare cases for the absolutely worst crimes. For anything else, you receive a punishment, be it money or months/years in jail, and after that, you deserve a chance to live a life…

Being forced to change the profession is not the same as being in jail forever or being unable employable forever.

> Beyond knowing what you did, and remembering the punishment, which for most people is already a burden heavy enough.

Like, seriously? These people do not feel bad, there is no heavy burden. They are proud of how they earned money, feel like any prosecution is grave injustice and would do it again.

Widely immoral people, whether in politics or business, dont feel sorry for who they are. They made those decisions because there was no moral dilema for them.

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