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I understand your sentiment, but I think this only applies if you want to be an especially good person. The rest of the professional world does not have to matc

by kolbe 8y ago

I understand your sentiment, but I think this only applies if you want to be an especially good person. The rest of the professional world does not have to match such a high standard of ethics, and as much as I would love for everyone to have to behave nobly, it's pretty unreasonable to ask software engineers to report software that exploits loopholes in regulations while our counterparts in banking, private equity, law and medicine basically live exclusively off of doing that. edit for the downvoters: in this exact case, the executives of the companies hacked the system, their lawyers probably approved of it, and the strategists who conceived of it likely used to work as investment bankers. And yet, the software engineers are the ones expected to take the high road?

EpicEng 8y ago
> while our counterparts in banking, private equity, law and medicine basically live exclusively off of doing that. Literally every one of those professions are governed by legal ethical requirements. Software engineers/devs are not, which is kind of the whole point.
- kolbe 8y ago
  PE doesn't any more than programming. Banking's laws are just moats for the established players masquerading as regulations. Law has them, but in a strange twist, their ability as lawyers make it so that they don't matter. And medicine is too complex for me to really comment, but from my vantage point, it looks like they're free to be scumbags so long as they claim they won't be when they get their degree. But every one of these are largely just regulated by the idea that if you're too big of a scumbag, the feds will nail you for wire fraud. That seems to be the only real rule of law or code of ethics we have in the professional world. And software engineers have to obey it as much as everyone else.
  - EpicEng 8y ago
    >>PE doesn't any more than programming. Banking's laws are just moats for the established players masquerading as regulations. PE sure, I probably should have noted I know little about that, but when you talk about banking you're now going from "have no ethics laws" to "well, they exist, but they're not effective in my opinion." >Law has them, but in a strange twist, their ability as lawyers make it so that they don't matter Lawyers get busted on ethics violations all of the time. My mother is a lawyer and for a short time I worked as a pseudo legal secretary in a mid sized city. I recall numerous lawyers being disbarred for ethics issues. I have no idea what the real numbers are, but I don't think you do either. >And medicine is too complex for me to really comment, but from my vantage point, it looks like they're free to be scumbags so long as they claim they won't be when they get their degree. So you don't really understand the issue, but you've heard some stuff on the news and maybe from friends, so you write the entire things off. How about civil engineers who are personally liable for their work? >But every one of these are largely just regulated by the idea that if you're too big of a scumbag, the feds will nail you for wire fraud. That seems to be the only real rule of law or code of ethics we have in the professional world. And software engineers have to obey it as much as everyone else. Again, moving goalposts. If you don't feel the current regulations wrt doctors, lawyers, and bankers are enough, fine, many would agree, but that's not the issue here.
    - kolbe 8y ago
      >PE sure, I probably should have noted I know little about that, but when you talk about banking you're now going from "have no ethics laws" to "well, they exist, but they're not effective in my opinion." Oh, if we're going to be pedantic about what exists, then software engineers have them. There are computer hacking laws! And software IP and copyright rules. See, we're regulated, too. I thought we were operating on the premise that the existing structure was insufficient or irrelevant to any meaningful end, but since it technically exists, I'm not sure why you're arguing that we need to create them. Honestly, your entire reply seems like you're going out of your way to miss the point. When you made a mistake about PE, I didn't concoct some strawman to try to embarrass and highlight your ignorance, so I don't know why you're trying to do that to me. A software engineer's counterpart isn't some ambulance chaser getting disbarred. Biglaw associates are the professional counterparts to software engineers. And in medicine, I've seen tens of thousands of extra opioid deaths and hundreds of billions in insurance/medicare scams attributed to the medical industry to have a bit of an opinion at least. If you think the argument that industry-specific regulations don't matter, and that the only regulations that matter are federal fraud laws is a goalpost change than I don't know what to tell you. My argument is that the industry codes don't matter, and that any semblance of actual regulation takes place at the federal fraud level, so putting an unnecessary step of internal regulation is pointless.

by kolbe 8y ago

EpicEng 8y ago

> while our counterparts in banking, private equity, law and medicine basically live exclusively off of doing that. Literally every one of those professions are governed by legal ethical requirements. Software engineers/devs are not, which is kind of the whole point.

kolbe 8y ago
PE doesn't any more than programming. Banking's laws are just moats for the established players masquerading as regulations. Law has them, but in a strange twist, their ability as lawyers make it so that they don't matter. And medicine is too complex for me to really comment, but from my vantage point, it looks like they're free to be scumbags so long as they claim they won't be when they get their degree. But every one of these are largely just regulated by the idea that if you're too big of a scumbag, the feds will nail you for wire fraud. That seems to be the only real rule of law or code of ethics we have in the professional world. And software engineers have to obey it as much as everyone else.
- EpicEng 8y ago
  >>PE doesn't any more than programming. Banking's laws are just moats for the established players masquerading as regulations. PE sure, I probably should have noted I know little about that, but when you talk about banking you're now going from "have no ethics laws" to "well, they exist, but they're not effective in my opinion." >Law has them, but in a strange twist, their ability as lawyers make it so that they don't matter Lawyers get busted on ethics violations all of the time. My mother is a lawyer and for a short time I worked as a pseudo legal secretary in a mid sized city. I recall numerous lawyers being disbarred for ethics issues. I have no idea what the real numbers are, but I don't think you do either. >And medicine is too complex for me to really comment, but from my vantage point, it looks like they're free to be scumbags so long as they claim they won't be when they get their degree. So you don't really understand the issue, but you've heard some stuff on the news and maybe from friends, so you write the entire things off. How about civil engineers who are personally liable for their work? >But every one of these are largely just regulated by the idea that if you're too big of a scumbag, the feds will nail you for wire fraud. That seems to be the only real rule of law or code of ethics we have in the professional world. And software engineers have to obey it as much as everyone else. Again, moving goalposts. If you don't feel the current regulations wrt doctors, lawyers, and bankers are enough, fine, many would agree, but that's not the issue here.
  - kolbe 8y ago
    >PE sure, I probably should have noted I know little about that, but when you talk about banking you're now going from "have no ethics laws" to "well, they exist, but they're not effective in my opinion." Oh, if we're going to be pedantic about what exists, then software engineers have them. There are computer hacking laws! And software IP and copyright rules. See, we're regulated, too. I thought we were operating on the premise that the existing structure was insufficient or irrelevant to any meaningful end, but since it technically exists, I'm not sure why you're arguing that we need to create them. Honestly, your entire reply seems like you're going out of your way to miss the point. When you made a mistake about PE, I didn't concoct some strawman to try to embarrass and highlight your ignorance, so I don't know why you're trying to do that to me. A software engineer's counterpart isn't some ambulance chaser getting disbarred. Biglaw associates are the professional counterparts to software engineers. And in medicine, I've seen tens of thousands of extra opioid deaths and hundreds of billions in insurance/medicare scams attributed to the medical industry to have a bit of an opinion at least. If you think the argument that industry-specific regulations don't matter, and that the only regulations that matter are federal fraud laws is a goalpost change than I don't know what to tell you. My argument is that the industry codes don't matter, and that any semblance of actual regulation takes place at the federal fraud level, so putting an unnecessary step of internal regulation is pointless.