One of the false positives you hear from those who want to “reform” the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which in reality means weaken or even gut it, is that it is the fault of “those people” in corrupt countries that have their hands out. It is generally along the lines that the only way to do business is to grease the palms of everyone involved. In these reformers’ next step of logic, they opine that U.S. corporations that engage in bribery and corruption are simply doing what is expected in countries outside the United States.

Thomas Fox has practiced law for over 40 years. Tom writes the daily award-winning blog, the FCPA Compliance and Ethics blog and founded the Compliance Podcast Network. Tom leads the discussion on AI in...