I think I understand what you're saying and I agree that no software developer should willingly write code that will be used to break or circumvent the law. I believe that if I was put in such a position that I would walk rather than implement the feature. I don't think we are alone in that feeling, I believe many developers feel the same way.
I worry that a feature meant to circumvent or break the law will not be easy to spot. Many projects are broken into smaller pieces that interact, many times the laws or rules change from state to state. Even in regular day to day work I'll see a feature request that effectively undoes another request. Often developers are working in areas in which they are not subject experts.
I think it's easy to write code that could (or even will) be misused; it may not look troubling until it's interacting with the larger system.
But that's why I'm arguing that we have to think about it. As well as why I'm not arguing for legal accountability.
We have to be aware that the things we create aren't always going to be used for what we intend them to be used for. So you frequently have to ask yourself "how could this be abused?" That is something that engineers frequently ask themselves. I don't understand why developers can't be asked to do the same.
You are totally right, I honestly agree with you. It's an important question, it's worth asking and we should all be asking it. I think there's a lot more grey in software development, grey people may not have as much of in other fields. But that does not mean we can simply ignore the question and it certainly doesn't diminish it's importance. More than that, it doesn't diminish our responsibility.
My concern really revolves around the scapegoating and protecting developers from situations where there is more grey than black or white. But that is not a sheild from personal responsibility or moral obligation, the questions you raise are important in their own right.
I definitely think the ethical concerns are a little more abstracted with software than general engineering. I mean it is more obvious how a bridge affects people than a social network.
But because of that I'm not calling for legal obligation. But I'm calling for more people thinking about the abstraction and how what they write could be abused. But it is no easy matter. Ethics are hard.
I worry that a feature meant to circumvent or break the law will not be easy to spot. Many projects are broken into smaller pieces that interact, many times the laws or rules change from state to state. Even in regular day to day work I'll see a feature request that effectively undoes another request. Often developers are working in areas in which they are not subject experts.
I think it's easy to write code that could (or even will) be misused; it may not look troubling until it's interacting with the larger system.