It could go a very long way - from what I've read, it would appear to be deliberate evasion of US EPA rules, and was intended to mislead. In the US at least, there seems to be talk of not only individual (and possibly class action) lawsuits against VW, but also of other manufacturers also taking action, which could easily run into billions.
I doubt they'll fret too much - if it gets too serious, they'll probably use the same "too big to fail" argument that the banks did
