The ‘Horizon’ Scandal — 1 Software Bug, 736 Convicted, and 230 Jailed on False Charges, 4 Suicides
What can happen when a software bug is hidden for 20 years?
This is what has been happening in the United Kingdom from 1999 to 2019.
In 1999, the UK’s Post Office introduced new software developed by Fujitsu, called ‘Horizon’. This program aimed to assist in managing all postal operations across the country.
It’s worth mentioning that, just as many other Post services that manage bills, money transfers, and others, the UK Post Office also acts as a bank.
Being the Post Office a bank, means that the ‘Horizon’ program needed to operate with the strictest compliance to ACID: Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, and Durability. A basic requirement that software development have learn to manage since Relational Databases are a thing. Indispensable to meet in banking environments.
However, the ‘Horizon’ program did not have ACID properly implemented, and in a few cases, transactions were either lost or duplicated. It is hardly surprising, as at that time they were facing the challenges of the Internet for the first time, as an evolution of intranets. And even back then, it was common to encounter problems during online purchases if the connection…
