[quote=no_such_reality]LOL, a top VW exec blamed a couple rogue software developers for the emissions thing

[quote]“This was a couple of software engineers who put this in for whatever reason,” Michael Horn, VW’s U.S. chief, told a House subcommittee hearing. “To my understanding, this was not a corporate decision. This was something individuals did.”
[/quote]

Wow is he that clueless or just that boldface of a liar? Or worse, he’s telling the truth and VW really has no idea what has been encoded into their engine control modules?[/quote]

I’ve wondered this since the story broke. How high up the food chain was aware of what was going on?

Depending on how much code review was going on, it wouldn’t be hard to slip something like this in. Over the years, programmers have slipped all kinds of things into applications and games. But what would be the motivation of a software engineer to do this?

My guess is that a directive to get better performance probably came down the food chain, and someone shrugged and said,
“Okay here you go, I’ll just turn off the emission controls. There fixed that.” It’s funny how crazy things like that can happen in a corporate environment where the bosses don’t want bad news, only good, and employees are pressured to show results at whatever costs.

Just a guess though. Could also be that plenty of people knew and VW is just trying to cover their collective ass.