Fixing Horizon bugs would have been too costly, Post Office inquiry told(theguardian.com)
theguardian.com
Fixing Horizon bugs would have been too costly, Post Office inquiry told
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/17/post-office-inquiry-fixing-horizon-bugs-fujitsu-developer-gerald-barnes
13 comments
edit: The police investigation was about the newer horizon not the older one so might not be related to those bugs (but maybe other ones!)
My burning question about this: What was the 'state of mind' of the higher-ups at the post office when they started prosecutions and then continued prosecutions into the hundreds? It's clear that the higher-ups at the post office knew these issues were caused by software rather than the postmasters, they must have known as early as 1998 or 1999.
Maybe at first they must have thought that these were one-off issues and that they could just prosecute one or two postmasters, sweep the whole thing under the rug and forget about it. But that doesn't explain how they continued prosecutions into the hundreds years down the road. Like what did they think the endgame here was? Just prosecute indefinitely to cover up for the system?
Maybe at first they must have thought that these were one-off issues and that they could just prosecute one or two postmasters, sweep the whole thing under the rug and forget about it. But that doesn't explain how they continued prosecutions into the hundreds years down the road. Like what did they think the endgame here was? Just prosecute indefinitely to cover up for the system?
> What was the 'state of mind' of the higher-ups at the post office
The Post Office was a money-hole; it hadn't made money since privatisation. It was effectively still a government agency.
UK government agencies have a long history with ICL, the UK "champion" mainframe maker, which was taken over by Fujitsu. It appears that this "champion" status was inherited by Fujitsu.
ICL couldn't compete with companies like IBM on merits; they had to have backdoor support from politicians and the civil service. I don't know how that worked; but if MI5, the armed services, the National Grid and so on were reliant on ICL, then it's understandable that government would want to encourage agencies to buy ICL.
So I suspect that the PO were pressurised by ministers and civil servants to buy Horizon from ICL/Fujitsu, and further pressurised to keep schtumm about the defects. Well, that's my guess: the higher-ups owed their jobs and reputations to ministers and civil servants, because they were effectively employed by a government agency, and it was losing money, and the government wanted to protect the reputation of ICL/Fujitsu.
The Post Office was a money-hole; it hadn't made money since privatisation. It was effectively still a government agency.
UK government agencies have a long history with ICL, the UK "champion" mainframe maker, which was taken over by Fujitsu. It appears that this "champion" status was inherited by Fujitsu.
ICL couldn't compete with companies like IBM on merits; they had to have backdoor support from politicians and the civil service. I don't know how that worked; but if MI5, the armed services, the National Grid and so on were reliant on ICL, then it's understandable that government would want to encourage agencies to buy ICL.
So I suspect that the PO were pressurised by ministers and civil servants to buy Horizon from ICL/Fujitsu, and further pressurised to keep schtumm about the defects. Well, that's my guess: the higher-ups owed their jobs and reputations to ministers and civil servants, because they were effectively employed by a government agency, and it was losing money, and the government wanted to protect the reputation of ICL/Fujitsu.
I don't understand the state of mind of the government elected in 2011. The whole system was set up under the previous government, it would have been costly and difficult to come clean and do the right thing, but they could have blamed the entire thing on Labour and made political hay over it.
Instead Ed Davey doubled down on the lying and persecuting ordinary postmasters, over an issue that until then he had no personal accountability for. This is what democracy is for, to provide the opportunity for a reset, to change course, and a mechanism for accountability of those who made the mistakes. Instead he allowed himself to be co-opted by the system.
Instead Ed Davey doubled down on the lying and persecuting ordinary postmasters, over an issue that until then he had no personal accountability for. This is what democracy is for, to provide the opportunity for a reset, to change course, and a mechanism for accountability of those who made the mistakes. Instead he allowed himself to be co-opted by the system.
> What was the 'state of mind' of the higher-ups at the post office
I'm not defending the post office, but I suspect you have to look at it in context.
My understanding is that during that period of time (1999–2002) the Post Office's accounts took two large hits:
I'm not defending the post office, but I suspect you have to look at it in context.
My understanding is that during that period of time (1999–2002) the Post Office's accounts took two large hits:
- £570m write-off of the failed Horizon project
- £1bn losses from the so-called renewal plan
The prosecutors were getting paid for convictions, of course:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/10/post-office-exec...
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/10/post-office-exec...
Most 'enterprisey' systems of the era were just as shoddy as Horizon. The problem was that the post office were in a position to aggressively prosecute users and decided to do so (and then the whole chain of cover ups and dissembling for years after as widely documented).
All in all its a lesson in just how easy it is to cover your arse as an executive in a large company, and get away with pretty much anything. Only the most tenacious work by many people over decades has any chance of holding you accountable.
All in all its a lesson in just how easy it is to cover your arse as an executive in a large company, and get away with pretty much anything. Only the most tenacious work by many people over decades has any chance of holding you accountable.
It seems to me that the Horizon system is just a simple accounting/POS thing. I can't understand how it could be built so shoddily. It doesn't even have that many clients: there are less than 12k post offices in the UK.
Governments often have a ton of overly complex and poorly documented rules. Add in bad incentives and people put into roles they are poorly suited and it can go to hell pretty quickly.
Here is an anecdote from a past job.
1. Years ago (decades), someone made the contract rules. They did it in an ad hoc not very systematic way. They assumed everything would be judged by a human and be judged reasonably.
2. That person left and the department expanded.The rules had to become more formalized, but still room for plenty of exceptions. An exception could be a penciled scribble in the margins in a file or later on, a sticky note.
3. Time to digitize. Unfortunately, computers like standards and need every little rule must be programmed.
4. A business analyst with no real understanding of the system is hired to generate requirements for digitization. The current overseer of the rules, someone who doesn’t use a computer much (yes, these people still exist) kind of just nods every time he creates these tremendous flow charts. this is the first degradation of knowledge. Even then though, this business analyst is not technical or legally trained, so doesn't appreciate why defining things like "end of day" or "contract billing cycle" precisely is crucial. even if he could, many contracts had sticky note individual definitions.
5. The business analyst goes back and feeds the information into the ticket mill of Scrum. To be nice and agile, work is done in bite sized increments with no regard for context. This is the second knowledge degradation. All those flow charts are chopped into little boxes. Devs see ambiguities, but have no interest in pushing back.
6. Developers only have the tickets to work on and quotas to meet, so write the code as requested. Testing is another set of people, so code is just tossed over to QA. QA has no more context than dev, so if it matches the ticket, they approve it.
6a. Nobody budgeted for automated testing so things break over time for lack of tests. Product Owner wouldn't grasp the concept, business analyst had a budget and wanted to deliver more features, and devs didn't want to fight about it.
7. Final increment goes back to product owner who doesn't understand and just nods. A piece of software that doesn't work all that well gets approved. Repeat for years and constantly adding post-it note rules as code and you have a system that has lots of errors.
Here is an anecdote from a past job.
1. Years ago (decades), someone made the contract rules. They did it in an ad hoc not very systematic way. They assumed everything would be judged by a human and be judged reasonably.
2. That person left and the department expanded.The rules had to become more formalized, but still room for plenty of exceptions. An exception could be a penciled scribble in the margins in a file or later on, a sticky note.
3. Time to digitize. Unfortunately, computers like standards and need every little rule must be programmed.
4. A business analyst with no real understanding of the system is hired to generate requirements for digitization. The current overseer of the rules, someone who doesn’t use a computer much (yes, these people still exist) kind of just nods every time he creates these tremendous flow charts. this is the first degradation of knowledge. Even then though, this business analyst is not technical or legally trained, so doesn't appreciate why defining things like "end of day" or "contract billing cycle" precisely is crucial. even if he could, many contracts had sticky note individual definitions.
5. The business analyst goes back and feeds the information into the ticket mill of Scrum. To be nice and agile, work is done in bite sized increments with no regard for context. This is the second knowledge degradation. All those flow charts are chopped into little boxes. Devs see ambiguities, but have no interest in pushing back.
6. Developers only have the tickets to work on and quotas to meet, so write the code as requested. Testing is another set of people, so code is just tossed over to QA. QA has no more context than dev, so if it matches the ticket, they approve it.
6a. Nobody budgeted for automated testing so things break over time for lack of tests. Product Owner wouldn't grasp the concept, business analyst had a budget and wanted to deliver more features, and devs didn't want to fight about it.
7. Final increment goes back to product owner who doesn't understand and just nods. A piece of software that doesn't work all that well gets approved. Repeat for years and constantly adding post-it note rules as code and you have a system that has lots of errors.
At some point one should just give up and do it by hand. There is so much overautomization nowadays that in practice are time sinks and deadlocks the org.
A sane system would be 'contract A type' and all other be done manually or something.
A sane system would be 'contract A type' and all other be done manually or something.
>3. 3. Time to digitize. Unfortunately, computers like standards and need every little rule must be programmed.
Er....shit in. Shit out?
Er....shit in. Shit out?
Not necessarily. More of a lost in translation.
A great example of something hard to digitise is mechanisms for reward/punishment. Algorithmic approaches for criminal sentencing that work on a parameterised basis have been proposed over the years but always found wanting.
A great example of something hard to digitise is mechanisms for reward/punishment. Algorithmic approaches for criminal sentencing that work on a parameterised basis have been proposed over the years but always found wanting.
There was a quote from one of the insiders[1] which said there was a team of 8 developers, 2 knew what they were doing, a couple more were competent, and the other 4 were incompetent (on the Joel scale, in the idiot + gets things done quadrant). I can imagine that trying to write a reliable product in that environment was difficult to say the least.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/09/how-the-post...
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/09/how-the-post...
It’s not ‘simple’ EPOS. Some of the things sold were local and held at the counter, e.g books of stamps, others were centralised virtual services (eg taxing your car). Even today the Post Office has a range of weird options not found elsewhere, e.g use of ‘postal orders’ that allow people to send money to recipients who don’t have bank accounts. All of these can be accessed at a post office counter.
That said, it was certainly shoddy
That said, it was certainly shoddy
>shoddy
'Shoddy', being a euphemism for 'beyond knowingly-being fucked-up, so much so that we'll cover it up oh fuck we're still alive this wasnt what we were told would happen'?
I dunno, or maybe just me surmising.
'Shoddy', being a euphemism for 'beyond knowingly-being fucked-up, so much so that we'll cover it up oh fuck we're still alive this wasnt what we were told would happen'?
I dunno, or maybe just me surmising.
The rule of English understatement is that the more understated, the more damning. So "a touch shoddy" would "stunningly beyond knowingly-being absolutely totally fucked-up ...", you get the picture.
Slightly different take: it was a state contract fulfilled by the company best able to impress state procurement. Quality is rarely on the agenda for this sort of procurement, because if it goes wrong they can blame the management who were overseeing the implementation. Thus it was unlikely to be great from early on.
I'm currently working on a 'simple' integration between an accounting and crm software. I'm already pulling my hair because of various exceptions, limitations and whatnot. I think Horizon was anything but simple.
> I think Horizon was anything but simple.
Yes, you're probably right. But this is the part that really bugs me :
"The inquiry heard that in 2008, a glitch in a system called CABSProcess, which automatically summarises a post office’s transactions at around 7pm daily, resulted in users working at the same time having balancing issues."
This, for an accounting system is just fucking inexcusable!
I worked on a huge accounting project for a financial institution processing 2M account bookings per day (at that time, it's a lot more now). A lot of effort was put into the audit log (every booking was written to an append only log) and into the reconciliation process. When it was 20 Rappen off there was digging until the inconsistency was found.
That transactions are not completely isolated when that CABSProcess kicked in is just completely and uttelry inexcusable.
Yes, you're probably right. But this is the part that really bugs me :
"The inquiry heard that in 2008, a glitch in a system called CABSProcess, which automatically summarises a post office’s transactions at around 7pm daily, resulted in users working at the same time having balancing issues."
This, for an accounting system is just fucking inexcusable!
I worked on a huge accounting project for a financial institution processing 2M account bookings per day (at that time, it's a lot more now). A lot of effort was put into the audit log (every booking was written to an append only log) and into the reconciliation process. When it was 20 Rappen off there was digging until the inconsistency was found.
That transactions are not completely isolated when that CABSProcess kicked in is just completely and uttelry inexcusable.
Just allow import and export from and to Excel... Problem Solved
<<I wish I was joking>>>
<<I wish I was joking>>>
Yeah. I work as a PM in a company that builds integrations between ERP and "heavier" accounting systems. It is absolutely not simple, to the point where we are building an ETL-style engine to drive things. It's not "copy record X to Y".
Except there's 20,000 POS, sometimes multiple per shop, with dial up ISDN on POS machine 1 per shop, except a few rural systems that need satellites
Maintenance of 20k POSs might be a pain, but writing the software is not that hard, especially if your budget is in the billion ballpark.
Except the "coping with dial on demand" part of the software was brand new, not even finished for the pilot.
Not sure a sometimes offline distributed database where data is temp stored on POS machines is such an easy thing to write either
As usual: rushed, not well tested, assumed to be perfect
Not sure a sometimes offline distributed database where data is temp stored on POS machines is such an easy thing to write either
As usual: rushed, not well tested, assumed to be perfect
Are all the details of this out in the open yet?
Certainly there were bugs that made it seem like there was more money coming in than actually did, but it seems like also there were capabilities in the platform that would also allow editing records to make it seem like there was actually less money coming in, which would enable skimming money out of the system almost (?) invisibly.
Certainly there were bugs that made it seem like there was more money coming in than actually did, but it seems like also there were capabilities in the platform that would also allow editing records to make it seem like there was actually less money coming in, which would enable skimming money out of the system almost (?) invisibly.
Some details are there, see the inquiry website. From what I gather the "covert" remote access could only add records rather than edit records. Like putting something on a message stack. However you could add a record to edit a balance I imagine. Where "records" are "messages". I don't think you could actually get money out that way only remotely. Also a record of the record would be made, you couldn't erase remote access activities on the stack.
I also don't think this capability was ever suggested anywhere as being used in conjunction with a postmaster to skim money out. Maybe its possible in theory?
I also don't think this capability was ever suggested anywhere as being used in conjunction with a postmaster to skim money out. Maybe its possible in theory?
If I'm reading the article correctly, the headline claim is about a bug that was discovered in the original Horizon system right as it was about to be replaced with a new system, Horizon Online, at which point the bug fix would be completely useless. Other things like bugs in audit reports that continued to matter and affected the prosecution of subpostmasters were officially priorities, they just did a terrible job of handling them.
Even now, just by observing the use of systems at the Post Office, you can tell it's still a bad system. You can see the staff constantly mashing a button on their non-standard keyboard.
[deleted]
"too costly"... remind me how much was taken as profit or handed out as bonuses in relation to Horizon?
This classic short-termism is all too common in software engineering. The reputational damage and likely compensation will exceed by far the costs of identifying and fixing these bugs. However, the CTO at the time has long moved on, and likely got a decent bonus at the time by cutting software engineering resources.
Which is why such reputational fallout needs to taint not only the MBA careers involved, it has to burn everyone involved and really hurt. The schools who educated them, there future employers, such shenanigans with the lifes of others have to make you radioactive. Taking the money for the responsibility has to involved some damocles swoards hanging over the boards.
We need laws that allow historical clawback of bonuses/rewards that later turn out to have been given in the context of significant failures.
That should only trigger when there are legal proceedings with injured/wronged innocents. Otherwise you'll have companies clawing back bonuses when poorly conceived products flop.
I'm not drawing a connection between your two sentences there. Like, that still doesn't sound like a bad idea!
So you do great work and get a bonus, but then the marketing department botches it, or executives decide to price it in some inane way that consumers reject and now you owe your employer money? Dystopian.
[deleted]
This is a general problem in business, not just software.
Management are motivated by short term bonuses.
The biggest shareholders are fund managers who get judged on their annual performance (In the UK there are annual performance tables published. I assume it is similar in other countries) so they have a short term outlook as well.
Private equity have a slightly longer term view, but not much more so.
No one has a stake in what happens a decade from now.
Management are motivated by short term bonuses.
The biggest shareholders are fund managers who get judged on their annual performance (In the UK there are annual performance tables published. I assume it is similar in other countries) so they have a short term outlook as well.
Private equity have a slightly longer term view, but not much more so.
No one has a stake in what happens a decade from now.
There would have been to compensations if they just had not persecuted the people for a known software bug. Might still have been cheaper to wait for a new system
[deleted]
If the CEO of the Post Office or Fujitsu would end in jail for a life sentence, trust me, you will never hear anymore a case where "it would hve been too costly".
But now, in the end, the companies themselves will just get a financial fine at some point, not even matching what it would have costed them to do the change. And so no real consequence, no change...
But now, in the end, the companies themselves will just get a financial fine at some point, not even matching what it would have costed them to do the change. And so no real consequence, no change...
This is what I don’t understand. A company violates a law, makes 10 million in profit from breaking said law, and gets a 1 million fine.
Surely it ought to be: pay back all 10 million, PLUS compensation to the people from who you illegally got money, PLUS a fine, PLUS holding the actual people making the decision (because surprise, a company is just actual real people doing stuff) at the very least financially accountable.
Surely it ought to be: pay back all 10 million, PLUS compensation to the people from who you illegally got money, PLUS a fine, PLUS holding the actual people making the decision (because surprise, a company is just actual real people doing stuff) at the very least financially accountable.
Fujitsu's didn't prosecute anyone or send anybody to jail. All they did was write software that had bugs in it.
If you look at the version history of any software, you'll find it's full of bug fixes. Writing software without bugs is literally impossible. It's incredibly complex and written by "actual real people" and that means there will be mistakes.
If those mistakes lead to millions in liability, then you're going to have to start paying me those millions upfront, before I write a single line of code.
It's the same with a CEO - if people are criminally liable for mistakes made by people working under them... then nobody's ever going to accept a job where they delegate work to other people.
The solution to this issue is not to attack people who made a mistake. It's to put systems in place where you check for mistakes. I guarantee you the jury and courts that found these people guilty were presented with "facts" such as "nobody else can remotely access the software" which, it turns out, were total bullshit. The people who presented those facts in court are the ones to blame for this. They clearly either lied or made assumptions.
Both of those are serious crimes. You don't say anything in court unless you actually know it yourself. If someone else tells you something is true, you don't repeat what they said. You bring those people in as an expert witness to talk to the judge/jury directly, under oath, and you tell them not to make any assumptions either.
There should have been millions spent on a full code audit done checking for bugs in the software before allowing it to be admitted as evidence in court.
If you look at the version history of any software, you'll find it's full of bug fixes. Writing software without bugs is literally impossible. It's incredibly complex and written by "actual real people" and that means there will be mistakes.
If those mistakes lead to millions in liability, then you're going to have to start paying me those millions upfront, before I write a single line of code.
It's the same with a CEO - if people are criminally liable for mistakes made by people working under them... then nobody's ever going to accept a job where they delegate work to other people.
The solution to this issue is not to attack people who made a mistake. It's to put systems in place where you check for mistakes. I guarantee you the jury and courts that found these people guilty were presented with "facts" such as "nobody else can remotely access the software" which, it turns out, were total bullshit. The people who presented those facts in court are the ones to blame for this. They clearly either lied or made assumptions.
Both of those are serious crimes. You don't say anything in court unless you actually know it yourself. If someone else tells you something is true, you don't repeat what they said. You bring those people in as an expert witness to talk to the judge/jury directly, under oath, and you tell them not to make any assumptions either.
There should have been millions spent on a full code audit done checking for bugs in the software before allowing it to be admitted as evidence in court.
Obviously writing software with bugs in it shouldn’t be illegal, unless in violation of the SLA.
But knowing this and lying about it, as was done by the Postal Service, Fujitsu management and insurance companies, most definitely should.
You shouldn’t be liable for mistakes, but you should be liable for malcontent
But knowing this and lying about it, as was done by the Postal Service, Fujitsu management and insurance companies, most definitely should.
You shouldn’t be liable for mistakes, but you should be liable for malcontent
Yup - and this is where we're at with car safety too. Car marque CEOs are free to say "Yeah, it'll cost hundreds of millions to fix, it's cheaper to pay out per death for a rare event".
We're all worn down by this and, in essence, we operate on blood money.
We're all worn down by this and, in essence, we operate on blood money.
A*B < C
There isn't even a fine here. The post office is owned by the government, and practically insolvent as it is. The claims against Fujitsu are theoretical and might already be too old.
However bad the software is and however bad the software-related decisions at Fujitsu and the Post Office were, nothing should distract from the fact that the real culprit is really with the Post Office leadership who destroyed the lives of 900 people, ridiculed them, forced over 40 into suicide and countless others into falsely claiming guilty to bargain when faced with a lawsuit they had no hope to win at the time. Equally guilty is every politician and bureaucrat above them who failed to raise their voice or take action, as the case may be. Instead, the former head of the Post Office has moved on to the next sinecure (at NHS this time) and was awarded a CBE. Thankfully a recent High Court decision has condemned those in charge in no uncertain terms. The damage of this decade-long scandal for all of society is tremendous.
A large chunk of the blame goes to the legal system as well, especially the assumption that computer records are correct, unless proven otherwise - which is a nearly impossible uphill battle for the defendants in such cases. I can recommend this article on the topic https://emptycity.substack.com/p/how-the-legal-system-made-i...
While that is true, specific people people knew that the system is faulty and lied in county. They should be in prison for perjury.
The article I linked touches on that much more elaborately than I possibly could, so forgive me the large quote:
> But a saddening thing is that if it were not those particular identifiable individuals who were culpable (and they certainly should be held to account) then it would have been other individuals doing the same things. And this is because of legal and corporate contexts that facilitated this wrongdoing.
> This is not to say that the guilty people can themselves blame the system - the culpable individuals could and should have done different things, at each and every step. Indeed, exceptional individuals could have stopped the nonsense and the cruelty.
> But these were not exceptional individuals - they were individuals doing what they (wrongly) believed to be their job or performing what they (wrongly) believed to be their function or protecting what they (wrongly) saw to be legitimate interests.
Those people are culpable for their actions, but they did so in a system that made doing the wrong thing easy, and such shortcomings will lead to another case like this.
> But a saddening thing is that if it were not those particular identifiable individuals who were culpable (and they certainly should be held to account) then it would have been other individuals doing the same things. And this is because of legal and corporate contexts that facilitated this wrongdoing.
> This is not to say that the guilty people can themselves blame the system - the culpable individuals could and should have done different things, at each and every step. Indeed, exceptional individuals could have stopped the nonsense and the cruelty.
> But these were not exceptional individuals - they were individuals doing what they (wrongly) believed to be their job or performing what they (wrongly) believed to be their function or protecting what they (wrongly) saw to be legitimate interests.
Those people are culpable for their actions, but they did so in a system that made doing the wrong thing easy, and such shortcomings will lead to another case like this.
It all started with a simple business decision: do we fix costly bugs, or send to jail a few folks?
The sending people to jail option also included demanding postmasters pay £1,000s to the Post Office for money that the Post Office (wrongly) alleged had been stolen. It could have been the profitable option.
I suppose then the high compensations and prizes for the initiators of such a grand business scam^Widea appear more than justified.
Cue the McKinsey analyst that did “the cost of an overdose death vs revenue from pushing doctors to over-prescribe” slide for the Purdue family…
"A McKinsey and Deloitte consultant are asked to seat a classroom of children, but there are fewer chairs than kids. The Deloitte consultant recommends buying more chairs. The McKinsey consultant recommends killing the excess kids."
Excuse me. That's not 'killing' them, that's "rightsizing" the class.
[deleted]
Fujitsu is also to blame.
Good have simply said that their software can't be trusted.
> Equally guilty is every politician and bureaucrat above them
Just for the “but they’re a private company” crowd: the company is wholly owned by the government and there is a minister whose responsibilities include postal affairs which includes the Post Office
Just for the “but they’re a private company” crowd: the company is wholly owned by the government and there is a minister whose responsibilities include postal affairs which includes the Post Office
Exactly. One does get the feeling that privatizing an entity but then keeping it in the governments, err, vicinity is very convenient; if anything has to be excused or justified you can always choose one from "but it's a private company" or "since it is effectively controlled by the government", whatever works for you-
AFAIK there were 4 suicides related to this scandal. Where did you get 40 from?
I stand corrected. Sorry for that, not sure what I read; Wikipedia and the Sun (of all papers) say there were four, not fourty
[deleted]
Right now on YouTube there are Fujitsu staff being asked questions by the enquiry on this topic.
Worth also saying that some bugs were discovered in a product which was due to be replaced by a new system so it was considered low priority to fix. However it impacted cases of several years before it was discovered.
I think maybe that 2 Fujitsu employees are either investigation or being currently prosecuted by the met police, so there are criminal proceedings being under taken right now in relation (I guess) to these bugs in the older version of the code. There's not much info about this currently for obvious legal reasons.