Being able to drop a critical zero-day without catching a federal charge is a luxury built on decades of pushback.
As governments and corporations finally realized how hackers could help them, they pushed to create exceptions to laws like the CFAA and DMCA. This paved the way for responsible disclosure policies.
Companies started adding "safe harbor" language to protect researchers who report vulns in good faith. Through the work of platforms like Bugcrowd and HackerOne, major tech companies adopted these policies, and eventually governments followed suit.
The more we protect and value ethical hackers, the safer everyone gets. 💯