6.02 p.m. ET (2202 GMT) May 18, 1999

MOSCOW  Russia's government agencies are not working fast enough to tackle the Year 2000 computer bug, and the Economics Ministry and Finance Ministry are among the least prepared, a senior official said Tuesday.

Acting Deputy Prime Minister Vladimir Bulgak also named the Federal Energy Commission and the State Land Committee as being slow in resolving the millennium bug, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported.

As of May 7, not a single ministry or department had applied for money to finance work on the bug, Bulgak told a meeting in Moscow on the Y2K glitch, Russian news reports said.

Twenty departments had not even submitted plans on how they would tackle the problem.

The Y2K bug may occur if older computers that use two figures to designate a year mistake the year 2000 for 1900 and shut down or produce erroneous information.

While many are concerned about what will happen Jan. 1, Bulgak warned that Russia should also be ready for Sept. 9, when experts say computer systems may read the date 9-9-99 as an error message.

Russia appeared oblivious to the Y2K bug until recently. The Nuclear Ministry spokesman said a few months ago that his agency would "deal with the problem when we get to 2000.''

Russia is also in a deep economic depression and the lack of funds to upgrade computers has delayed work on the glitch.

Link

-- (trend@watcher.now), May 18, 1999

Answers

The Y2K bug may occur if older computers that use two figures to designate a year mistake the year 2000 for 1900 and shut down or produce erroneous information.

When the media quits including that line in every Y2K story, I will begin to think that maybe they are not DGIs.

-- Doug (douglasjohnson@prodigy.net), May 18, 1999.

well, at least they're consistent...:-)

Arlin

-- Arlin H. Adams (ahadams@ix.netcom.com), May 18, 1999.

Yeah, at least in THAT area ;-)

-- Tim (pixmo@pixelquest.com), May 18, 1999.

BUT, Ya gotta remember, in the words of arguably one of the greatest living DJ's (in a private interview for a specific radio station's staff) "Your audience is basicaly low rent."

ROFL

Chuck

-- chuck, a Night Driver (rienzoo@en.com), May 18, 1999.