Microsoft President: Democracy Is At Stake. Regulate Big Tech

Re:Microsoft President: Democracy Is At Stake. Regulate Big ... by goatherders on Saturday September 14, 2019 @12:36PM (#20971894)

Disagree. The idea that whatever you are asked to do has been vetted by others is an abdication of ethical responsibility. At present, a lot of what tech companies do is still legal, but that doesnt make it right. It's still legal because the maps of cyber law are largely still uncharted. An engineer working on a project that tracks user behavior without consent (for example) shouldn't be absolved or responsibility because their manager said it was okay.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Microsoft President: Democracy Is At Stake. Regulate Big ... by eitland on Saturday September 14, 2019 @12:58PM (#20972107)

Sometimes it is not clear cut.

Getting the same result in different ways can legal or not:

Obvious example:

Saving a x amount of money from taxes using a legal loophole is legal.

An exact equal company trying to save the exact same amount of money by lying to is doing something illegal.

Far less obvious example:

Around here (and possibly elsewhere, I don't know) if you make a drink from wine and spirits you have to pour the spirit first because increasing the strength of wine is illegal, but decreasing the strengt of spirits are OK.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Microsoft President: Democracy Is At Stake. Regulate Big ... by anovikov on Monday September 16, 2019 @02:45PM (#20987252)

Last point is hilarious! Can't upvote that enough.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Microsoft President: Democracy Is At Stake. Regulate Big ... by shard on Saturday September 14, 2019 @04:06PM (#20973398)

A curious alcohol law with an interesting side effect. Where are you located?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Microsoft President: Democracy Is At Stake. Regulate Big ... by eitland on Sunday September 15, 2019 @01:25PM (#20978313)

Norway.

I thought it was an old joke, but someone I have reason to believe said it was true and you could get in trouble for it.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Microsoft President: Democracy Is At Stake. Regulate Big ... by strken on Saturday September 14, 2019 @02:15PM (#20972664)

I'm not sure that moral responsibility for investigating the legality of instructions should rest with the employee, in cases where the instructions aren't clearly repugnant.

Consider the example of engineers getting the details of tax compliance in a payroll system wrong because their boss provided the wrong instructions. To my mind, they should not be at fault for this unless they demonstrably knew what they had been asked to do was illegal.

[ Parent | on HN ]