[ls612]

Yeah I suppose the prevent part came from the Browser/CA forum giving the CA that did it the death penalty like they did for Kazakhstan's CA in 2015 but if the men with guns point them at executives of browser providers and say "trust this CA or else" then CT is more of a cosmetic system than anything else.

[perching_aix]

What I more meant is that it's a reactive arrangement rather than a proactive one, so it cannot be preventative outright. Domain owners are expected to actively monitor the CT logs for abuse, and take action if they see any. This necessarily means that abuse can still happen, at least for a little while.

[XorNot]

Do the executives implement program features?

The most striking thing about these types of conspiracy theories is people seem to completely forget that whoever you imagine you can threaten generally doesn't have the ability to do the thing you want them to do: they'd have to delegate it.

[ls612]

So given that this is widely accepted to have actually happened why has the CA involved not received the death penalty like the Kazakh one did?

[perching_aix]

Because unlike in that case, the CA in this story is not suspected to have done anything wrong, despite what the post's wording might suggest. See my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48340259