Re: vicariously liable
The problem here is other countries would have to go along with such a prosecution. Many countries will not extradite for such charges.
Further, AM's own liability would be a more likely cause of action as it should now be quite clear that they had nearly no security, did the same to competitors (minus the data dump), and ran around outright lying as to what service they actually provided. Some people happened to have affairs, sure, but the vast majority didn't for the same reason as they couldn't in real life - they just plain suck.
If anything, the possible criminal charges that AM executives may face regarding the preceding 'issues' should be the focus of the police media push. Ignoring all the other factors stinks to me of the police being pressured from above. I suspect someone(s) more powerful will be exposed. A more appropriate police statement would be to suggest ways of finding help for those affected as those most likely to self harm are likely the 'chump' users and do need to find a way to wind up their relationships so all involved can move on.
Suicide
Yesterday morning, upon reading the news, I instantly looked up suicide stats (Statscan has some good dbs) and found similar to the PS quote in the article. Of course, I wanted to see if there was a further refinement to the oft quoted 12.1 per 100k in the US. Canada's is a tad lower as is most of Western Europe, but given mostly males in the 40-60 bracket, this is actually more like 25+ per 100k.
Assume that people are likely in the top part of the income segment only cuts this to around 15 at the least. Now multiply by the marriage troubles factor of around 2 and we get 100-150 suicides per week based on 25-30M male users. We can multiply this by whatever fraction were clearly tied to it, but the figures will still be quite high.
Conclusion: Getting Out-ed Cheating using AM SAVES LIVES!
Biting the hand that feeds IT
