Hacker News Reader

Comment by vec | Hacker News Reader

I'd accept a minimum statuatory fine of 100% of the profits from your criminal activities. White collar crime, when discovered, should always be a net loss for the plaintiff's balance sheet.

It's not perfect, but if you make ten billion dollars from fraud, I feel like first you should lose the whole ten billion dollars as a matter of course, after which we can start discussing what if any punishment is appropriate.

View on HN

"It's not perfect, but if you make ten billion dollars from fraud,"

I don't see how this applies to this matter. From what I read in the article, Uber was being sued and investigating a crime that occurred through the application of their service. In other words, if they did something wrong, it wasn't in the pursuit of profit, it was in defense of another lawsuit or the ultimate private settlement thereof.

Yes, however they still profit from winning such lawsuits, if this was typical behavior, then theoretically they should be on the hook for any money they avoided paying by using such methods. For example if they were invading the privacy of the people in the drivers lawsuit (where they ended up paying 100 million) and used it to win instead, then that would be the amount they should be on the hook for. The point is that any illegal behavior in corporate governance means the corporation and the people who stand to benefit from it automatically loose entirely on the related matters. Which is guaranteed to be effective at stopping illegal behavior.

Of course this is in the case of criminal fraud, which hasn't been brought up in this news case you are correct.

The lawsuit is against the business. Defending from a suit and profit are commingled interests; there is no separating them.

Really it should be something like 1.2*profits/(probability of discovery) so that the expected return on criminal activities is negative.

People still play the lottery.

White collar crime is currently more akin to investing in the stock market or mutual funds than it is to playing the lottery, and a lot more people invest a lot more money because you're likely to have a positive return. You can still loose, but it's probably a good investment.

A fine proportional to the resulting profits and the risk of discovery would change the profile from the former to the latter, and would hopefully result in fewer people playing the game.

What would you do about PHI leakers, computer operators at hospitals/clinics, who leak celebrity information. Sometimes it's not for profit and one can't just block access as access is necessary to process the patient, for example. These are often low paying jobs to boot.

100% of $0 is $0.

I'm not saying that should be the only punishment. I don't even think it should technically count as part of the punishment. I'm just saying that if the prosecution can demonstrate that you (or your employer) profited from a crime, then you should always lose those profits in addition to whatever punishment the court deems appropriate.

Change profits to revenue, and it's a better deterrent.

> 100% of the profits from your criminal activities

No it should be higher than that.

      Expected ROI = profits - P*fine.

P is probability of getting caught and is strictly less than one. If fine is equal to profits ROI is positive and engaging in illegal activity is a rational, if immoral, thing to do.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com