Charging individuals sounds good in theory
But how does that work in practical terms? Let's say you subpoena corporate records to find out what happened. First there's a meeting with 12 people where one of them suggested a plan similar to but not exactly like what they did, there was some discussion and others offered suggestions to "improve" it until they hashed it out and decided "we should do this", and recommended it to higher ups.
The higher ups had a meeting with 8 people who offered further tweaks to the plan and one asked "is this ethical?" and another asked "how much trouble will we be in if we're caught?" but in the end there is sufficient agreement to send the proposal up to some VP in an email that said something like "hey Mr. Bossman we're going to do X, just wanted to give you a chance to object if you think this is the wrong path" and Mr. Bossman does not reply.
So who do you charge? The person in the original meeting of 12 who suggested something like this? All 12 of them for being in a meeting that recommended this, even if some of the 12 never spoke a word during the meeting and the only record of their participation is being listed as "attending" in the meeting minutes? The 8 who sent it up to Mr. Bossman, or do you let the guy who asked "is this ethical?" off the hook? What about Mr. Bossman, who may or may not have even read the proposal in detail, but is definitely not on the record as having approved it?
Responsibility tends to be very diffuse in large organizations. That's a weakness when you need to move quickly, but is a strength if you want to avoid responsibility. In an organization where the CEO is micromanaging little details it would be easier to pin something like this on him if he was on the record saying something like "well yeah we all know this is immoral, but we'll make more money so as long as we do a good job of covering it up we can laugh all the way to the bank!" It would be nice if someone could say something like this and stick out like a sore thumb, but unfortunately that's not how the real world works.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
