Almost two decades after the millennium bug failed to bite, Jordan Erica Webber looks at the potential consequences for big tech of the end of another era: Emperor Akihito’s reign in Japan

Next year will be the 20th anniversary of what some joked was one of the biggest anticlimaxes to have struck the globe: Y2K. But cybersecurity experts still want us to remember the lessons of the “millennium bug”, and be mindful of similar events that could impact us in future.

Emperor Akihito of Japan is expected to abdicate the throne on 30 April this year and big tech has warned the end of this era could have a similar effect to what it was feared the dawn of the millennium would have.

As the first few weeks of January 2000 went by without huge disaster, those who were expecting a digital apocalypse started to ask questions.

What had actually happened? Why had they been told to worry? Was it all a scam?



Jordan Erica Webber talks to the Y2K expert Martyn Thomas, who sheds some light on why the millennium bug wasn’t as bad as predicted – and why we shouldn’t ignore the possibility of a real disaster in the next few years.