However plausible it may be, it is still not excusable.<p>The company should have processes in place that can verify the claims it makes. Plausible deniability is really just a claim of neglect.<p>Edit: I&#x27;m being rate-limited, so I&#x27;ll respond to the points below right here:<p>&gt;What processes should be in place, exactly, to do what?<p>How about driving a vehicle in the manner most of their customer&#x27;s do and examining the emissions?<p>&gt;Quarterly polygraph tests performed by all engineering managers<p>How would that help exactly? Polygraph is demonstrably unreliable.<p>&gt;to assure top management they haven&#x27;t broken any laws?<p>It&#x27;s mostly irrelevant how assured top management is about anything. What matters, in this case, is how far out of spec the vehicles Volkswagon produced are. That is what needed to be verified: specs vs. facts.