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This says they'll get compensation, so that's good. But somebody needs to go to jail for covering this up. A lot of somebody's probably.

alistairSH 2y ago
Yeah, I really hope some higher-ups at both the national postal service and Fujistu go to jail over this. And how the hell did the post office come to believe 700+ sub-post-masters were committing fraud? It strikes me as patently ridiculous that such a large number of people would be doing similar small-time accounting fraud. Nobody thought "huh, might be the systems?"
- JusticeJuice 2y ago
  A lot of people who aren't software developers have blind faith that software is always correct. Inversely, software developers never trust software to be correct.
  - dpwm 2y ago
    In England and Wales, at least, there’s even a legal principle that information produced by software is correct unless it is proven otherwise. [0] [0] https://openaccess.city.ac.uk/id/eprint/32105/ https://openaccess.city.ac.uk/id/eprint/32105/
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  - alistairSH 2y ago
    Sure, and once the cases made it to court, I can see jurors taking the software evidence at face value. In this case, somebody should have pumped the brakes well before criminal proceedings. But, it seems like the higher-ups didn't want to look bad, so buried evidence and charged anyways, which should be criminal (no idea if it is, I'm no expert in UK law).
- ziggy_star 2y ago
  Here, may it serve you well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Castle_(novel) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Castle_(novel)
- janice1999 2y ago
  > Nobody thought "huh, might be the systems?" The Post Office knew their system was broken from at least 2003. Their response was to bury the report and threaten the consultant. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-67921974 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-67921974
- seanhunter 2y ago
  Yeah that genuinely boggles my mind about the whole thing. Less than 20 frauds I would say fine. 700+ is as you say patently ridiculous. It just is very obviously wrong and it’s very disheartening that noone in the senior management at the post office or fujitsu pumped the breaks at that point and tried to do a root cause analysis
pas 2y ago
> A lot of somebody's probably. very tangential, very important: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y65FRxE7uMc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y65FRxE7uMc
janice1999 2y ago
> This says they'll get compensation, so that's good. It looks like they will get compensation this time, but only after being featured on an ITV TV drama. The first time around the government drip fed compensation and massively reduced figures, including to people who served jail time for crimes that never happened. Many of the victims are old and some were made homeless because of the Post Office. It was just extra cruelty and maliciousness on top of the injustice they had suffered. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-61187241 https://www.bbc.com/news/business-61187241

alistairSH 2y ago

Yeah, I really hope some higher-ups at both the national postal service and Fujistu go to jail over this. And how the hell did the post office come to believe 700+ sub-post-masters were committing fraud? It strikes me as patently ridiculous that such a large number of people would be doing similar small-time accounting fraud. Nobody thought "huh, might be the systems?"

JusticeJuice 2y ago
A lot of people who aren't software developers have blind faith that software is always correct. Inversely, software developers never trust software to be correct.
- dpwm 2y ago
  In England and Wales, at least, there’s even a legal principle that information produced by software is correct unless it is proven otherwise. [0] [0] https://openaccess.city.ac.uk/id/eprint/32105/ https://openaccess.city.ac.uk/id/eprint/32105/
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- alistairSH 2y ago
  Sure, and once the cases made it to court, I can see jurors taking the software evidence at face value. In this case, somebody should have pumped the brakes well before criminal proceedings. But, it seems like the higher-ups didn't want to look bad, so buried evidence and charged anyways, which should be criminal (no idea if it is, I'm no expert in UK law).
ziggy_star 2y ago
Here, may it serve you well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Castle_(novel) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Castle_(novel)
janice1999 2y ago
> Nobody thought "huh, might be the systems?" The Post Office knew their system was broken from at least 2003. Their response was to bury the report and threaten the consultant. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-67921974 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-67921974
seanhunter 2y ago
Yeah that genuinely boggles my mind about the whole thing. Less than 20 frauds I would say fine. 700+ is as you say patently ridiculous. It just is very obviously wrong and it’s very disheartening that noone in the senior management at the post office or fujitsu pumped the breaks at that point and tried to do a root cause analysis

pas 2y ago

> A lot of somebody's probably. very tangential, very important: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y65FRxE7uMc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y65FRxE7uMc

janice1999 2y ago

> This says they'll get compensation, so that's good. It looks like they will get compensation this time, but only after being featured on an ITV TV drama. The first time around the government drip fed compensation and massively reduced figures, including to people who served jail time for crimes that never happened. Many of the victims are old and some were made homeless because of the Post Office. It was just extra cruelty and maliciousness on top of the injustice they had suffered. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-61187241 https://www.bbc.com/news/business-61187241