September 28th, 2015: a date that will live in infamy for the Volkswagen Group, as the truth behind the most fraudulent scandal in the history of the automaker industry began to unfold to an unsuspecting, yet infuriated public. On this date, Volkswagen was notified by the Emission Protection Agency (EPA) that their vehicles violated the Clean Air Act, and that all of Volkswagen’s “Clean Diesel” automobiles contained a defeat device, in which they passed the emissions tests, but spewed out Nitrogen Oxides emissions at many times the legal limit.

These “Clean Diesel” vehicles, which were meant to less harmful to the environment than average car, turned out to have emissions 5 to 20 times the legal limit in the Volkswagen Passat, and an astounding 15 to 35 times the legal limit in the Volkswagen Jetta, respectively 2 of the most popular Volkswagen vehicles. In the United States, there are currently around 500,000 Volkswagen “Clean Diesel” vehicles that don’t meet the Clean Air Act, in addition to nearly 11 million other “Clean Diesel” vehicles worldwide. As discussed earlier, these vehicles contain a defeat device, which allowed the vehicle to recognize when it was in an emissions test, therefore turning the pollution controls on, but while it drove normally, it spewed out unacceptable amounts of Nitrogen Oxides as well as smog-forming compounds.

This colossal, deceitful scandal has brought on ubiquitous criticism from an onslaught of enraged consumers, environmentalists, car critics, Volkswagen share owners, and Congress, just to name a few. Over the past month, many highly-ranked Volkswagen’s employees, such as Volkswagen CEO, Martin Winterkorn, have resigned due to embarrassment from the scandal as well as pressure from the public to do so. In addition, in the month of October, Volkswagen’s stock has absolutely plummeted, due to the public being extremely unhappy with the company, as well as the company setting aside billions of dollars in order to make up for the damage that they have done.

Although the scandal has been revealed, no one wants to take responsibility, as no Volkswagen executives have admitted any information or knowledge about the scandal, as they all have reported that they were completely unaware of this activity. In the future, Volkswagen is likely going to be responsible for repairing millions of cars to meet emissions standards, as well as probably facing lawsuits, prosecutions, and jail time as a result of the scandal. Overall, Volkswagen will likely face lots of difficulty in the future, as well as struggle to repair their tarnished reputation to their world-class engineering.

Volkswagen recently has been pressured by the public as well as blitz of furious critics to reveal the truth of the scandal; who was behind it, were the company executives aware of what was happening, why did they do it, etc. On the other hand, nearly everyone wants to know how their ingenious, yet now infamous plan, of how their “Clean Diesel” vehicles tricked emissions tests for years. Although it would be interesting to figure out how Volkswagen orchestrated this deceptive scheme, Volkswagen should fix the problem and apologize for their actions, yet they shouldn’t reveal how they did it.

Apologizing is the easiest part of this predicament, and that is exactly what Volkswagen should do immediately, to mollify to outspoken, enraged public. In addition, Volkswagen should repair all of their “Clean Diesel” vehicles in order to lessen the controversy in the future. However, Volkswagen shouldn’t come clean on how the whole plan went down, as this would worsen the situation because the public isn’t ready to hear the truth, since it hasn’t been long enough. Although Volkswagen’s reputation might someday be recovered, looming questions about Volkswagen’s morale will be ubiquitous and everlasting.