Year 2000 bug can bite Canada across borders
Kathryn May
The Ottawa Citizen
The Canadian Forces may be ready to fight the millennium bug at home, but the major risks facing Canada if computers fail in 2000 will come from outside its borders.
"The largest risk for Canada is what is happening in other countries that don't have time to get their systems fixed before 2000," said Lou Marcoccio, director of Y2K research at The Gartner Group, the leading firm tracking the world's Year 2000 preparedness.
"We're going to have bank unrest, power and telecommunications failures happening in about 20 countries that will affect the rest of the world in the long term. We're going to have major inflation, the cost of goods rise and shortages of key resources."
According to Gartner's latest survey, the United States, Holland and Canada are at least 50 per cent ahead of the rest of the world in ridding their computers of the millennium bug.
The bug was created by computer programmers who used two digits, not four, to denote years to help save computer memory. This means when 2000 arrives, computers could read "00" as 1900, which could shut systems down, cause them to function erratically or make errors.
Mr. Marcoccio said he expects Canada will experience some isolated and "minor" inconveniences caused by disruptions to critical services, such as power, telephones and transportation, but nothing of the magnitude that the Armed Forces are gearing up for.
The military has been ordered to plan for the worst -- dubbed Operation Abacus -- with troops and frigates ready to be deployed across the country to provide emergency services should computer foul-ups in 2000 create civil chaos.
"I don't think all that is necessary because the overall risks are pretty minimal to major services and infrastructure," said Mr. Marcoccio.
Gartner ranked the "infrastructure risks" of 87 countries and found Canada was among the 12 countries who face the lowest of disruption in supplies of power, oil. gas, food, water, telephone, and banking. Canada, however, was more vulnerable to interruptions in its export and import trade and government services -- particularly at the municipal and provincial levels.
He said banks, insurance companies and investment companies are the most prepared, while schools, hospitals, the agriculture industry and some municipalities are the least prepared.
But he warns the Canadian economy will feel the rippling effects of a global recession that will be created by the computer failures of other countries who are months, if not years, behind Canada, in repairing their systems.
He expects major problems from Russia and China, along with many nations in Latin America, Central Africa, and Southeast Asia. These problems could fuel a global recession that lasts four to six years.
"Countries already plagued with financial woes, sharp increases in inflation, limited monetary reserves and high unemployment are some of the same countries farthest behind on year 2000 compliance," Mr. Marcoccio wrote in a recent report.
Mr. Marcoccio, who recently presented his report to the U.S. Senate's special committee on Year 2000, is leading a major research project tracking the progress of governments and 15,000 companies in 87 countries. He found that 23 per cent of all companies and federal agencies have not even started any Year 2000 efforts.
The team heading the federal government's Year 2000 project agrees that Canada's risks from the backlash of computer problems in some countries are far greater than possible domestic problems.
"There are so many interdependencies beyond economic," said Dona Vallieres of the federal Year 2000 office. "It's a one-world community now, and the Asian crisis shows just how interrelated we all are."
Ms.Vallieres said it's "only prudent management" for the Forces to prepare for the worst, especially after the last winter's ice storm, which wiped out power and heat in cities and towns across Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec.
Although Canada is well ahead of most countries, it's not out of the woods yet. Mr. Marcoccio predicts about 15 per cent of companies and government agencies in Canada and the U.S. will face a major "mission critical failure" that could last three days or longer. He said any one of these shutdowns could cost up to $3.5 million.
The federal government's "mission critical" systems are those that provide the services Canadians rely upon, such Canada Pension Plan, employment insurance, tax collection, policing, border crossing, search and rescue, weather forecasts and employee payroll. By Gartner's yardstick, the federal government has fixed about 64 per cent of its mission critical systems and is expected to be finished by the end of the year.
Mr. Marcoccio warns that Year 2000 failures will begin long before Jan. 1, 2000. The number of failures will start this year as companies and governments begin their 1999-2000 fiscal year and will peak in the year 2000, finally ebbing by 2002.
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