Corporate Ethics File

 By now you've heard that VW has been accused of doctoring the software in their small diesel models to sidestep emissions standards. 

 The thing that hasn't been talked about is engineering ethics. An algorithm in the code detects when the vehicle is under test conditions and causes it to perform differently. 

This couldn't have been accomplished by just one person.

 Brian Benchoff looks at the conditions leading up to the scandal and discusses the engineering ethics involved. 

Automotive engineers are held to a higher standard because mistakes and cut corners can kill people.

 This kind of suspected deceit goes well beyond concerns of environmental damage.

 Willing ethics violations challenge our trust of the engineering as a whole.

The fallout from the Volkswagen diesel scandal is spreading fast to the company's other famous brands, including Porsche and Audi, and across the Atlantic to the U.S. 

The scandal reached down into the company's engineering corps as the CEO of Volkswagen's US business, the research and development chief from Audi and the engine chief from Porsche, which are part of the Volkswagen Group, are said to be following Volkswagen's CEO 
 out the door of the company, according to multiple reports Thursday. 

 The impending departures are a sign that the Volkswagen scandal is ready to grow to much larger proportions.

 The method by which Volkswagen diesel cars were able to thwart emissions tests and spew up to 40X the nitrogen oxide levels set by the Environmental Protection Agency was relatively simple.

 It was more likely no more than a single line of code used to detect when an emissions test was being performed and place the emissions system in an alternate mode — something as simple as a software "on/off" switch.

 Volkswagen AG CEO Martin Winterkorn, who stepping down as the result of his company's scandal, has said he had no knowledge of the emissions cheat, but software dev/test audit trails are almost certain to pinpoint who embedded the code and who authorized it.

 You can actually see who asked the developer to write that code," said Nikhil Kaul, a product manager at test/dev software maker SmartBear Software.

 
"Then if you go upstream you can see who that person's boss was...and see if testing happened...and, if testing didn't happen.

 So you can go from the bottom up to nail everyone." 

The DCMA has allowed carmakers to keep third parties from looking at the code in their electronic control modules.

 The effect has been that independent researchers are wary of probing vehicle code, which may have lead companies like Volkswagen to get away with cheating emissions tests far longer than necessary. 

In a July letter to the U.S. Copyright Office, the Environmental Protection Agency expressed its own concern of the protection provided by the DMCA to carmakers, saying it's "difficult for anyone other than the vehicle manufacturer to obtain access to the software."

 Kit Walsh, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said the legal uncertainly created by the DMCA "makes it easier for manufacturers to conceal intentional wrongdoing. 

The EFF has petitioned the U.S. Copyright Office for an exemption to the DMCA for embedded vehicle code so that independent research can be performed on electronic control modules (ECMs), which run a myriad of systems, including emissions.

 Eben Moglen was right.


Cars with diesel engines are far less common in the US as compared to Europe, and the reason for this is not as simple as fuel costs or simple preference. Diesel fuel contains more energy than an equivalent volume of gasoline, which translates to more miles per gallon. This comes at a cost, though: while gasoline engines emit more carbon dioxide, diesel engines emit far more nitrogen oxides (NOx) than their gas-sipping counterparts.

While diesel automobiles make up one third of the passenger vehicle fleet in Europe, they make up barely a fraction of cars on US roads. This comes down to a difference in environmental regulation.

Since the introduction of the US Clean Air Act of 1970, NOx emissions have been under tighter controls than CO₂ emissions.

In Europe, CO₂ is more tightly controlled than NOx. It’s a simple consequence of regulation that diesel cars would be more popular in Europe than the US.

 VW has over 400,000 cars on the road in the US that have this ‘defeat device’ installed in their ECM. The EPA can enforce civil penalties of up to $37,500 for each vehicle not in compliance with regulations, meaning Volkswagen could face a penalty of $18 Billion USD.

Volkswagen stock has dropped 20% in the last few days, and the entire chain of command, from the CEO of Volkswagen down to the lowliest engineer are sweating bullets.

Volkswagen is now the target of an investigation by the US Department of Justice, and there will be congressional hearings on the issue. It’s hard to imagine a worse situation Volkswagen could find itself in.

 Like the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, like the Johnstown flood, and like that one scene at the beginning of Fight Club, this will be one for the engineering ethics text books.

 If this does turn into a criminal investigation – and chances of that are good – we will eventually learn how this complete abdication of law and social responsibility came to be.

Until then, we’re left to guess how one of the biggest blunders of automotive history came to be, and where Volkswagen and the diesel car will be in the years to come.