How COVID-19 is affecting society

[Pancake]

I laughed hard at the image. 100% I did.

Then I was kinda impressed, it’s a clever way to indicate a priest. I’m sure it brings comfort to those dying in isolation. I don’t begrudge them that.
Clever solutions but hilarious image and caption. Win win.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

 

[Free]

We haven't tuned it out! We're busy getting a new president in place. Everyone knows we can't do 2 things at the same time.

*puts a stick of gum in her mouth as she walks away*

 

[Innula Zenovka]

This is dreadful. Gavin Williamson, the Education Secretary, is absolutely hopeless. He's bungled the epidemic right from the start, with constant bad decisions and rapid changes of policy, leaving teachers and head teachers, parents and students, completely confused over examinations, school closures, free school meals for children from families on low incomes, and so on.

It's a whole catalogue of incompetence, almost approaching Chris "failing" Grayling standards, and I'm sure he's only in his job still because otherwise the Home Secretary would be the most publicly incompetent member of the cabinet, and she's scary as well as useless.

Boris Johnson’s plans to test millions of schoolchildren for coronavirus every week appear to be in disarray after the UK regulator refused to formally approve the daily testing of pupils in England, the Guardian has learned.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) told the government on Tuesday it had not authorised the daily use of 30-minute tests due to concerns that they give people false reassurance if they test negative.

Regulator refuses to approve mass daily Covid testing at English schools

Exclusive: Boris Johnson’s plan to test millions of pupils a week in disarray after concerns raised

www.theguardian.com

 

[Arkady Arkright]

and I'm sure he's only in his job still because otherwise the Home Secretary would be the most publicly incompetent member of the cabinet, and she's scary as well as useless.

Plus he was Tory chief whip, which means he knows where the bodies are buried...

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Small businesses win Covid insurance payouts after UK supreme court victory

FCA said it would work with insurers to make sure they ‘move quickly’ to pay claims of more than £1bn

www.theguardian.com

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Plus he was Tory chief whip, which means he knows where the bodies are buried...

And within hours of my remark about the Home Secretary,

Over 400,000 crime records could be affected by police computer error

Fingerprint, DNA and arrest history records deleted and visa system thrown into disarray

www.theguardian.com

 

[Innula Zenovka]

 

[Innula Zenovka]

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

 

[Free]

I would hip hip, etc., but I don't have any energy left in me.

 

[Arkady Arkright]

And within hours of my remark about the Home Secretary,

Over 400,000 crime records could be affected by police computer error

Fingerprint, DNA and arrest history records deleted and visa system thrown into disarray

www.theguardian.com

Do we know if that system was outsourced and, if so, to who ?

eta: Just spotted that this wasn't a one-off "oops, I deleted the dataset", but the repeated applcation of the wrong procedures over a period of three months.

 

[Arkady Arkright]

Quick, somebody show this to the UK fishing industry...

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Do we know if that system was outsourced and, if so, to who ?

eta: Just spotted that this wasn't a one-off "oops, I deleted the dataset", but the repeated applcation of the wrong procedures over a period of three months.

According to the Times

A letter to chief constables yesterday revealed that a software error that deleted crucial evidence from the Police National Computer [PNC] could be worse than first thought.

The arrest records were accidentally deleted during a weekly “weeding” session to expunge data from the national computer, which is owned and operated by the Home Office. DNA and fingerprint records were also removed because the databases holding them were connected to the PNC.

Police look for 400,000 records wiped out in IT blunder

More than 400,000 fingerprint, DNA, arrest and offence records may have been wiped from police databases following a technology blunder, The Times has learnt. A letter to chief constables today revealed that the software error which deleted crucial evidence from the Police National Computer [PNC] co

www.thetimes.co.uk

Evernote link because paywall

 

[Arkady Arkright]

According to the Times

Found it again :
Technical issue resolved after '150,000 police records lost'

A coding error resulted in records that had been flagged for deletion being lost from the database before checks had been carried out to determine whether they could be lawfully held or not.

Police probes compromised after computer records deleted

And it reveals that a "weeding system", developed and deployed by a Home Office PNC team, started to delete records wrongly last November.
The process was only brought to a halt at the start of this week.

So it was an improperly tested in-house* coding error which wasn't spotted until 3 months after it went live.

* Possibly not 'in-house' - I found a wikipedia reference to it being run by a Canadian company in 2015, but I don't know if that's still the case.

The Police National Computer (PNC) is a computer system used extensively by law ... As of May 2015, the Home Office states that there are over 12.2 million ... is operated by the Canadian company CGI Group, on behalf of the Home Office.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Found it again :
Technical issue resolved after '150,000 police records lost'

Police probes compromised after computer records deleted


So it was an improperly tested in-house* coding error which wasn't spotted until 3 months after it went live.

* Possibly not 'in-house' - I found a wikipedia reference to it being run by a Canadian company in 2015, but I don't know if that's still the case.

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

Um. Backups. Don't they have backups?

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Um. Backups. Don't they have backups?

It would seem not, unless they're hiding from Priti Patel and daren't come out and tell her about anything before she starts yelling (now I understand why there was some rumour going round about the Home Office doing a feasibility study on reintroducing the death penalty).

Meanwhile, a thread concerning a survey specifically about compliance with lockdown restrictions in the UK that might be relevant elsewhere


ETA

Low-paid shun Covid tests because the cost of self-isolating is too high

Gig economy and patchy compensation could help coronavirus spread in some parts of England

www.theguardian.com

 

[Arkady Arkright]

Um. Backups. Don't they have backups?

I don't think back-ups would help much, given all the input data they'd lose if they reverted to last November...

 

[Free]

Um. Backups. Don't they have backups?

lol