Bedrijven die onveilige en buggy software op de markt brengen moeten door middel van een belasting "gestraft" worden, want alleen zo kan men ontwikkelaars aansprakelijk stellen. Het idee is afkomstig van David Rice, auteur van "Geekconomics: The Real Cost of Insecure Software". volgens Rice kost slecht geprogrammeerde software alleen al in de Verenigde Staten 180 miljard dollar per jaar, en heeft het vergaande gevolgen, zoals een neerstortende Boeing 757 in 1996, de grote elektriciteitsstoring van 2003 en niet te vergeten computercriminaliteit.
Door ontwikkelaars belasting te laten betalen, zouden klanten meer voor software moeten gaan betalen, maar die programma's zouden dan minder buggy zijn. "Op dit moment voelen mensen niet de sociale kosten van onveilige software. Dat probeert mijn voorstel te veranderen", aldus Rice.
Net als normale fabrikanten minder belasting betalen om "groener" te worden, zou een ontwikkelaar van programma's met schonere code voordeliger uit zijn. Op die manier zou ook de consument niet met de doorberekende belasting te maken krijgen, waardoor het voor consumenten loont om veilige software aan te schaffen.
Update 5/12
David Rice gaf ons de volgende reactie:
Hi. I'm David Rice, and no I wasn't drunk when I wrote this, nor was I on
XTC. I hope to high heaven that I'm not an idiot, either.
I apologize for writing in English since my Dutch is rather poor (or more
accurately non-existent). Wow. The translation for this did not come out
correctly so I understand why everyone on the list is so upset. The
translation I received was "insecure developers must pay taxes." This isn't
entirely accurate.
The idea behind a "vulnerability tax" is the same idea behind carbon taxes.
Pollution is an inevitable part of manufacturing. It is almost impossible to
produce an item without creating some form of pollution. The answer is not
to stop manufacturing as this makes everyone worse off. So what nations
around the world have done, including Europe, is to tax pollution.
Vulnerabilities are treated in the same manner. Since perfect software is
not possible, and vulnerabilites are in fact inevitable, we simply treat
vulnerabilities like we treat pollution: inevitable, but actionable. We can do
something to positively affect climate change and we can do something to
combat insecure software.
Not only would software manufacturers be taxed for producing "pollution"
but so too would consumers who chose to purchase insecure software.
This promotes (and rewards) software manufacturers that make better
software instead of what the market does now, which is reward defect-
laden software. Those software manufacturers that create less
vulnerabilites pass on less tax to the consumer.
WIll this make software more expensive at time of purchase? Absolutely.
But software is enormously expensive after the fact. Why complain about
Vista costing 1000EUR when it costs you an extraordinary amount to
protect it from exploitation? The problem with software is not that it is
expensvie...it is that it is not expensive enough.
The same reason is applied to carbon emitting vehicles. The problem with
cars is not that they are expensive, but that they are not expensive enough
to drive. So people drive and fill the atmosphere with carbon, "taxing" us all.
A carbon tax simply lets people feel the social cost of driving as well as off-
setting the expense of environmental damage. Does it fix everything? Of
course not. But it helps.
I hope my response comes out correctly in translation. My apologies if it
does not. I appreciate your discussion on this list am glad you feel strongly
about this.
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