Has stringent regulation on how people can experiment on dangerous pathogens led to an end of monitoring or proactive discovery?
Let's go back to your example. A grad student has a minor pathogen escape incident, and it doesn't harm anyone. Faced with years in federal prison and the effective end of their future, do you think there is a chance they might not self report?
I'll give you another example. Lots of pilots have stopped self reporting mental illness because it is extremely punitive for them to do so (after incidents like Germanwings). So the metrics look better, and the actual problem has been swept under the rug.
Also, why would it come down to single persons always? Mandating processes, controls, clearances, etc is also something done in various areas.
You can put incentives in to make sure organizations monitor and report vs trying to hide things.
Yes, this is exactly my point. Fining companies large % of their revenue and throwing their engineers in prison is not the way to get them to report these issues.
> If you make not reporting potentially worse than reporting, why not? Also, why would it come down to single persons always? Mandating processes, controls, clearances, etc is also something done in various areas.
Hiding things is way easier than finding things. Take the model hacking incidents. They could have just done their searches in a way that didn't turn up anything. Then they could say, "well, we did look for it..."
As far as auditing goes: I've never met an auditor that doesn't find something the company isn't okay with them finding.
Why do you think we even have regulations for how to deal with dangerous things then?
Scapegoats for the ruling elite when things go south, despite them knowing what could happen and giving them the money to do it anyway. You see, we never go after the capital (money) in that situation.
The point I'm trying to drive home is that when it comes to the collective safety of society, the approach needs to be collaborative rather than overly punitive. This is hard-won knowledge that we have gained as a society across many industries.
I do think our discussion is converging. A good regulatory framework with proper oversight and well-calibrated punitive measures is a much better approach than doing massive one off-fines and arrests.