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Interesting discussion; I've been on the road and missed most of this one.

From a legal perspective, it's actually fairly straightforward.

First, theft is theft; it doesn't matter if the victim exchanges are procuring funds in violation of a dozen finance regulations. If somebody found a way to steal something of value from them (e.g. Linden dollars) the exchange owners could reasonably complain to the authorities. Of course, theft involves taking "something of value" -- and admitting that they're exchanging stock in companies for "something of value" might not be the smartest idea in the long run. Even if they wanted to risk admitting that they're providing a means for users to exchange money for unregistered securities, getting a prosecutor to care is going to be tough sledding, particularly given the amounts involved.

Second, regarding the intellectual property issues, copyright law doesn't really care how a thing is copied, just that it is, at least for "direct infringement." In other words, if I'm a guy who wrote the script for an ATM and someone copies it -- whether via an exploit or because I carelessly left it exposed -- I have a claim. The mechanism isn't as important as the act of copying. Consider: books are right out there in the open, it's the act of copying one that gives rise to the claim, not working around any security provisions.

Finally, a "vicarious infringement" or "contributory infringement" claim against Linden Lab for not patching this faster isn't very plausible. The legal standard for indirect infringement (the catch-all category for vicarious and contributory infringement) is fairly high. For "contributory infringement" (which is what keeps getting file sharing software makers) the rule is that the provider must substantially participate in the infringement, such as inducing, causing, or materially contributing to the infringing conduct. Basically, by providing a service that facilitates infringement if that device or service has no substantial use other than infringement. Vicarious infringement involves being in a position to control the direct infringer and benefiting financially from the infringement. An argument could be made on both of these, of course, but it would be an uphill, expensive battle and I'd not give it very good odds based on the facts outlined above.