They're incapable of moderating the site because they're afraid they'll recruit moderators who abuse their power? This is true of literally any community and you can audit mod logs or remove the ability to delete entire threads (just posts). It seems like their technical issues are turning into community management issues
They have a legal obligation to moderate content that is against US law and probably against their own rules if they want to keep Section 230 protections. And everyone knows they have a problem with very frequent rule-breaking posts and large bots posting such content.
If there's not enough trustworthy janitors right from the start, it's increasingly likely they could get in trouble too quickly. I think that's what they're worried about.
"Comprehensive legal action", sure. They need to find the offenders first.
If I was a janitor I would seek legal action, but against the site owners. Not updating their website (that every script kiddie this century would love to hack) for 13 years is clearly a gross negligence.
If we can't prove this for billion dollar corporations that leak nationwide user data, I don't see how a judge will find 4chan grossly negligent.
Typically you need to show a "conscious and deliberate disregard" for the rights or safety of others, for it to be considered gross negligence. We could argue six ways to Sunday whether or not that's the case, but the only opinion that matters legally is a judge's.
https://0x0.st/8O16.png