Not Insurance, Liability [LWN.net]

Not Insurance, Liability

Posted Oct 22, 2017 1:29 UTC (Sun) by ssmith32 (subscriber, #72404)
In reply to: Not Insurance, Liability by jospoortvliet
Parent article: KRACK, ROCA, and device insecurity

Yeah, but that's just because the way the law is structured, you can avoid all kinds of personal responsibility by incorporating. The solution would be personal liability, not corporate liability.

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Not Insurance, Liability

Posted Dec 14, 2017 0:46 UTC (Thu) by immibis (subscriber, #105511) [Link] (1 responses)

That's dangerous territory too.

Personal liability means that, if the damages work out to many hundreds of thousands of dollars, the government can take away my house to pay them. Under those conditions you'll find a lot less people willing to release software. Or the price will massively increase to cover the required insurance. Free software would not be a thing either.

Not Insurance, Liability

Posted Dec 14, 2017 15:51 UTC (Thu) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]

> Personal liability means that ... you'll find a lot less people willing to release software ... Free software would not be a thing

There would have to be standards and licencing, so that there would be clear expectations on _both_ sides of what is acceptable practice, but if you are responsible for causing someone harm is it really a bad thing to have liability for your actions. The devils are in the details though because nothing is without boundaries, you can't have infinite liability and the user has some responsibility to use the tools properly, just like in Civil Engineering practice. Free software may not be impossible in that environment but it depends on the exact rules and policies which make that environment happen.