Not a lawyer and this is not legal advice, but I did ask my lawyer about the potential personal risks after receiving an offer. I used that as a data point when I declined the offer and for my speculative comment.
1. we have a substantial societal need to lock down powerful in-training AI
2. many are calling for making these companies criminally liable for hacking
3. security experts (like yourself) are turning down offers to help secure these systems in part because of potential liability
This indicates that #2 might be the wrong response. Security professionals are like lawyers supposed to be paranoid and think worst-case. If you want top security professionals to secure these systems, we might need a culture of FAA-style blameless retro.