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The US government can at last stand down on the Y2K bug, some 17 years after the threat came and went.

The Trump administration said Thursday that it will eliminate reporting requirements related to providing updates to preparedness planning for potential IT disruption at the turn of the last century. The move is intended to fulfill a promise President Donald Trump made on the campaign trail to reduce government regulation.

Of the more than 50 paperwork requirements eliminated Thursday, seven dealt with the Y2K bug, which was created by many computer programs being designed to enter years in only two digits -- the last two -- meaning 2000 might be mistaken for 1900. In the end, years of planning meant there were no major crises and far fewer headaches than had been predicted.

"These policies are now obsolete and outdated, as the Federal government was successfully unaffected by any service interruptions," the Office of Management and Budget said in a memo (PDF). "As a result, OMB is rescinding these memoranda because the deadlines for implementation have passed."

Trump signed an executive order shortly after taking office that requires two regulations to be removed for every new regulation added. The order requires that federal agencies self-identify which regulations to cut based on their estimates of the cost.

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