Where did a 2020 version of Y2K just happen?

Two decades ago, people feared that at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve, all hell would break loose in the digital world because computer systems wouldn’t be able to understand what year it was, since most programs only represented years by the last two digits. Fortunately, computer programmers anticipated the problem, dubbed Y2K, and worked to ensure that it wouldn’t happen.

The same cannot be said for what just happened in New York City. CNET reported Friday that parking meters throughout the city were unable to accept credit card payments starting at midnight on Jan. 1, 2020. The reason? The company that developed the credit card payment system for the city’s parking meters decided, for reasons unknown, that it’s system would not recognize any dates after Dec. 31, 2019. Then, it didn’t update its software to fix the issue, and so a mini version of the feared Y2K bug ensued.

City workers took to the streets on Friday to fix the issue manually, meter by meter. Hopefully that fix recognizes dates after Dec. 31, 2020, because it might take them that long just to get through all 14,000 meters.