Sent To Jail Because of a Software Bug 239
First time accepted submitter toshikodo writes "The BBC is reporting a claim that some sub-post office workers in the UK have been sent to jail because of a bug in the accounting software that they use. The Post Office admits Horizon computer defect. I've worked on safety critical system in the past, and I am well aware of the potential for software to ruin lives (thankfully AFAIK nobody has been harmed by my software), but how many of us consider the potential for bugs in ordinary software to adversely affect those that use it?"
Open Source... (Score:2, Insightful)
and shit like this doesn't happen or can at least be properly traced back by a third party and gives people the means to defend themselves.
In related news... (Score:5, Insightful)
A government spokesman has stated they have "absolute confidence" in all their computer systems, and what happened to Mr. Buttle was merely an unfortunate accident that could have happened to anyone.
Re:sounds like outsourcing or PHBs saying that (Score:5, Insightful)
It is outsourcing. The sub-postmasters who are being charged with fraudulent accounting over the results of these bugs are mostly former Royal Mail employees who were sacked and hired back as independent retailers contracted to provide postal services with contracts that transferred all the risk onto the small retailer providing the service.
Re:Open Source... (Score:2, Insightful)
then what, nothing in OSS land takes responsibility for itself, its free it (sort of works) if it doesnt fix it your self or fuck off
Re:Open Source... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sounds like a nightmare (Score:5, Insightful)
So these employees were forced to use the UK PO accounting software, which had bugs, and which showed in some instances imaginary shortfalls that they had to repay with no way of defending themselves. Sounds peachy! I hope some judge throws the book at the UK post office and finds some way to redress the situation.
Re:helpdesk india or helpdesk must use script fail (Score:5, Insightful)
Similar thing happened to me ~10 years ago(another EU country). National Telecom kept insisting I owed them money, when I called to see WTF is going on not so helpfuldesk assistant said he can see my payment and it cleared but system still wants moar money, he knows its a glitch and I can ignore it. A month later I get a bill for 2x what they imagined I owed them plus interest. I called again, asked for name of helpdesk guy, asked him to check it and informed next bill comes like this I will be reporting fraud to the police with his name attached - he cleared whole thing in 10 minutes.
Yes, this was very asshole of me, but it goes to show where is a will, there is a way.
Re:Open Source... (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, deliberate bugs and backdoors simply wouldn't be checked back in.
Re:helpdesk india or helpdesk must use script fail (Score:5, Insightful)
In what way were you being an asshole? Someone (or something) was trying to defraud you, and you stood your ground and made them (or it) stop. That's not being an asshole; that's merely being responsible.
Re:helpdesk india or helpdesk must use script fail (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem, I think, is that there weren't any books per se to begin with: Everything is tabulated with a computer, and the computer is wrong.
And when the computer is off by tens of thousands of pounds/dollars/whatever: OMFG.
But lying? No. Telling the truth is good, especially when it comes to official money. "I don't know what's happening because we're off by a huge amount of money, far more than we could ever accomplish in a day's business" is a good starting point.
(Just because the books are already cooked by some outside force, does not mean that one must continue to cook them.)
Re:sounds like outsourcing or PHBs saying that (Score:5, Insightful)
The sub-postmasters who are being charged with fraudulent accounting over the results of these bugs are mostly former Royal Mail employees who were sacked and hired back as independent retailers
...
Okay, so what they're saying is they fucked over the employees by taking away all their benefits and cutting their wages, they underfunded a software project that performed an apparently mission-critical function... and then fucked them over again when (surprise!) it didn't live up to the absurd demands of management.
Incompetence on this level by the government -- punishing the soldiers instead of the generals, has already lead to the failure of one major world economy whose various bureaucratic deitrius was "too big to fail", and I see Britain has failed to learn anything from the cluster fuck that is the remains of the US economy.
Well, British citizens... speaking as someone from the miserable colonies; It'll be nice to have some company.
Re:Open Source... (Score:4, Insightful)
A really wise post office chief would have done that audit before the first lawsuit.
Re:helpdesk india or helpdesk must use script fail (Score:5, Insightful)
*ahem*
The poor guy at the help desk: Was he, or was he not representing the company?
Re:In related news... (Score:3, Insightful)
You make great points, but I am forced to disagree with you on your conclusion. I don't come to conclusion that "these people are just thieves that got caught and are now trying to get off".
There's a guy who I knew who was sent to jail. He was charged with murder of his girlfriend. There were steroids, cocaine, and a fatal seizure involved. Now, I'm not saying the guy wasn't stupid, but the prosecutor of the case stated the following: individually, the facts make it look like he was guilty of murder, but when the facts are pieced together, the facts looked like an accidental overdose.
That was about 30 years ago. He was found guilty of murder and (if I recall correctly) served five years in prison. So was he really innocent? What happened? Why was he found guilty if he was innocent? I don't know. I do know that prosecutors are quite happy throwing people in jail in the U.S. today. See the drug war stats for that one. I also believe that prosecutors are quite happy to throw someone in jail just to help their careers. There seems to be stories popping up all over these days where innocent people are going to jail. Google "innocent people who have been put to death". If this can happen in the States, the post office story can happen in Britain.
Now, you make a very astute point. Nowhere in the article does it say where this missing money went. That is a very interesting point to me. You'd think it would be trivial for a reporter to find this out. From my perch, that means it can go any which way, because I don't trust government (in any country), I don't trust people and I certainly don't trust the media. This article leaves way too many questions.
The problem is trust (Score:5, Insightful)
They have misplaced trust in their computer system.
And misplaced lack of trust in human beings.
Accounting shortfall should not mean someone goes to jail.
It should mean a thorough investigation is launched, and the tool that first reported the shortfall should not be assumed to hold accurate information.
Re:Open Source... (Score:5, Insightful)
then what, nothing in OSS land takes responsibility for itself
Red Hat does. Even Ubuntu will to some extent. Any time you want you can get paid support for OSS and, given the right support contract and money they really will take care of you properly. The definitely take responsibility for the things they promise. (N.B. your two dollar desktop license really doesn't promise much at all).
Its free it (sort of works) if it doesnt fix it your self or fuck off
And this is the thing. We have seen before that people were sent to jail for bugs in breathalyzers [arstechnica.com]. In some cases people who claimed these bugs were in courts that demanded source; they were set free. In other cases the proprietary software companies behind the machines managed to get them locked away without a fair trial.
If the shit hits the fan with OSS you always have one more option and the possibility to approach multiple support suppliers. This won't happen for free and it likely won't be included in any existing agreements, however you may be happy for the chance to spend $15000 on software consultancy and not spend the rest of your life in some US State hellhole. Your proprietary software vendor will be thinking of all the other people that might sue about a bug like that and will never ever help you out of the problem.
Re:Open Source... (Score:4, Insightful)
If I reveal this source code to the sub-post offices and continue to buy from the vendor...
then...?
Re:Open Source... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Open Source... (Score:5, Insightful)
A really wise post office chief would have done that audit before the first lawsuit.
Yes you are correct, but the trouble is that the word 'Postmaster' conjours an image of someone with authority over a medium to largish business. In reality a lot of postmasters in the UK are simply running a family business/ small shop that just happens to be the Post office as well. A lot of these people have no real business training, do some very simple bookkeeping themselves, and when some software comes along that they've never had to use before, that software had better be bug free and easy enough to use. Before anyone says no software is bug free, I know that, by bug free I mean 'not going to add 13,000 to the turnover of a small business seemingly at random' . In short I think blaming the Postmasters for not being wise enough is just a wee bit disingenuous.
Re:want to be called engineers, dont want licensin (Score:2, Insightful)
More importantly, we prostitute ourselves to the People With Money. If Money says "no time for proper testing", "no time for proper documentation", "no time for proper architecture", we cave in 99% of the time. IT people are often very, very knowledgable, but we have absolutely no spine.
There are always "business reasons" for doing things in a half-assed way. Even when that means that other people (like Bank clerks) will go to jail for this.
But that is just one symptom of a wholly rotten system of corrupt rule and it appears it needs a proper implosion, before anything will be fixed. The banksters have taken over government and we the people already believe in their Money Ideology. We deserve all the shit we can get from this. Disregard the computer scientist, worship the money-changer and then take all the piss you can get from the money-changer.
Re:Open Source... (Score:5, Insightful)
A small shopkeeper (what most postmasters in the UK are these days) is shown to have a considerable amount of missing money. They are prosecuted by the post office and a jury convicts them. The fact the 'computer' says the money is missing is a part of the evidence against them but if the 'know' they didn't take the money and it can't possibly have been anyone else who works for them then surely they could already pay auditors to track the transaction records and show they don't make sense right? Except that would assume that they think to do it, are confident it will prove their innocence and can afford the considerable cost upfront.
Yes, in theory, open source lets you check. However a bug in a complex accountancy system is likely to be very difficult and if you didn't find the bug then it could actually strengthen the evidence against you.
I like open source; it is not, however, a panacea to all the worlds ills. The bigger question here is how a prosecution started by faulty accounting software ended in a conviction. Unless the defence did a very poor job, the prosecution overstated their case or the jury mis-applied 'reasonable doubt' surely this shouldn't have happened.