Gov't Could Spend $500M on Millennium Bug

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MOSCOW -- (Interfax) The Russian government may have to spend as much as $500 million to fix computers used in state agencies so that their clocks retain correct time after the year 2000, a government official told Interfax.

Aleksander Volokitin, deputy chairman of the State Committee for Communications and Information, said that committee chairman Aleksander Krupnov discussed the issue during a meeting last week with U.S. officials.

Krupnov met with William Kennard, newly appointed head of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, and Ambassador Vonya McCann, coordinator for International Telecommunications and Information Policy at the U.S. State Department. The officials agreed to include the millennium bug issue on the agenda of an upcoming session of the Gore-Kiriyenko Commission.

Volokitin said a final cost estimate will be made toward the end of the year following a survey of government computer resources taken in line with a government resolution of May 30.

The State Communications Committee will also submit a report in the fourth quarter of the year on the current state of its readiness to handle the problem. Volokitin said the Russian defense, fuel and energy, and transport sectors are most at risk from the problem.

The committee has already begun distributing recommendations to various departments on how to handle the crisis. In addition, a computer research institute (VNIPVTI) and the Russian companies Lanit and ES Lizing have set up a consultation center to test and certify software and hardware against the problem.

Volokitin said his committee will hold a special seminar Thursday for representatives of federal bodies to discuss the millennium bug problem. Specialists from IBM, Microsoft and Novell are to take part. Future seminars will include representatives of other computer firms active on the CIS market. ( (c) 1998 Interfax)