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To: WR who wrote (20850)	7/20/1998 10:29:00 AM
From: C.K. Houston	Respond to of 31646

Y2K CZAR ON SERIOUSNESS OF EMBEDDED CHIP PROBLEM =========================================================== CNN July 18 '98 KOSKINEN: " ...what I fondly refer to as "the growth industry of the problem": embedded chips or integrated circuits that run things like missiles, as well as oil refineries and power plants. O'BRIEN: And that's -- that makes it a very staggering problem when you get into those embedded chips. Give people an idea of how difficult it is to change all of those embedded chips so they are Y2K compliant. KOSKINEN: Well, the good news about the chips is that the experts estimate that only 1 or 2 percent of the chips are involved in processes that are date-sensitive. But one year recently, we shipped over four billion chips, so even if it's only 2 percent, that's 80 million chips out there somewhere that could create a problem. In an oil refinery, for instance, there are thousands of chips. Oil drilling rigs are estimated to have 10 thousand embedded chips in them. So finding the chips, determining whether they are involved in a process that's date-sensitive is a large-scale process, primarily for those operating systems. CNN July 18: cnn.com Y2K Task Force Chairman Discusses the March 1999, Debugging Deadline

To: WR who wrote (20850)	7/20/1998 10:50:00 AM
From: Esoteric1	Respond to of 31646

From the Forbes July 17th atricle: The millennium bug means big trouble for the Russian military--and us. Illogic circuits By Adam L. Penenberg n the Russia of the 1970s, the decision was made by its defense strategists to rely more on "firmware"--embedded chips--which are little more than chips on a circuit board. These processors can perform only limited tasks but are simple, reliable, durable and, as a testament to Russian pragmatism, don't short out in the event of an electromagnetic pulse because they are effectively shielded. Unfortunately, most of these chips are not year 2000-compliant, and fixing them is even more labor intensive than debugging COBOL. According to Sergey Fradkov, a software developer who served in the Russian military, soldiers in the field can't modify what he calls "logic modules." "You have routine checks that you run," Fradkov says. "You follow instructions: push this button and the light should be red, push that one and it should be green, then there are a series of signs and numbers. If something is wrong, you send the module back to the factory to be fixed." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Pentagon is four months behind schedule in its debugging detail but the Russians have barely begun. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The U.S. has not invested in embedded chips to the degree that Russia has, but it too has a major problem. Many of the Pentagon's computer systems depend on embedded maintenance routines. When it gets to 01/01/00 and a computer thinks its last maintenance check was 100 years ago, what will it do? How can you test all of these embedded chips? How do you even find them all, especially since some are off-the-shelf products? It's hard enough for the U.S., the world's most technologically savvy military, to adequately address the Y2K problem--and in many respects, the effort is falling short. The Pentagon is four months behind schedule in its debugging detail, and it could take the military 20 years to get every system year 2000 compliant. But the Russians have barely begun, and they are even more vulnerable to the millennium bug. What's the view from the Pentagon? "We're very concerned that the military leadership in Russia right now is coping with serious funding constraints," says Deputy Defense Secretary John Hamre. "They are falling back increasingly to rely on nuclear weapons as a safeguard for national security. And their early warning system is fragile. And they don't have a program to deal with year 2000." No wonder Hamre is anxious to share America's early warning information with Russia and other unnamed countries so that no one will panic if screens go blank. "That would be a very worrisome environment for all of us," Hamre says. top See also: Dr. Y2K Strangelove Could the millennium bug cause the Russians to accidentally launch a nuclear missile? The day the computers stood still 01/01/00 could be the perfect time to launch an attack. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Forbes Front Page ÿúÿ Forbes Magazine ÿúÿ The Toolbox Sitemap ÿúÿ Help ÿúÿ Search ÿúÿ Webmaster c 1998 Forbes Inc. Terms, Conditions and Notices forbes.com