• (cs)

    Good to see an ATM working properly. Makes me feel safe!

  • Anonymous (unregistered)

    Get in there Diebold! Doesn't exactly make you feel happy about all those closed-source voting machines, eh?

  • Steve (unregistered)

    I can almost understand an ATM running ASP.Net, but the fact that it's has remote error display turned on ?

  • (cs) in reply to Steve
    Steve:
    I can almost understand an ATM running ASP.Net, but the fact that it's has remote error display turned on ?

    Honestly, I think a smart application (if not something embedded) rather than a web application would be a better fit for an ATM. Is this really an ATM, or maybe just a kiosk that lets walk-in customers use their internal web-site?

    Either way, demerit for having remote errors turned on in production, another demerit for not having a strategy for catching unhandled exceptions and reporting them properly. Its not really that hard to do in ASP.Net.

  • (cs) in reply to Ryde
    Ryde:
    Is this really an ATM, or maybe just a kiosk that lets walk-in customers use their internal web-site?
    Here (Toronto, Canada) I see a lot of ATMs made by Diebold that look just like the one in the picture. Considering the error occurs in "/PNCBank", there's a decent chance this is actually an ATM.

    I think I may just avoid these machines in the future. I do love ASP.NET, but it probably wouldn't be my first choice for ATM software.

  • (cs)

    Heh, I've seen ATMs BSODing. Windows 95 style. I also got a nice userfriendly message once: "There are only $50 bills left." My choices were "Yes" and "No". I still wonder what would have happened had I clicked "No".

  • Josh (unregistered) in reply to freelancer
    freelancer:
    I also got a nice userfriendly message once: "There are only $50 bills left." My choices were "Yes" and "No". I still wonder what would have happened had I clicked "No".

    Ask your bank what would have happened (or more appropriately, what they would have done to you, your family and anyone that knows you). I'm sure they have an answer!

  • Lummox (unregistered)

    I really like the Diebold telling you to try and alter the configuration and turn debugging on to the user. Personally I'd rather it let you use the buttons on the side of the screen to set breakpoints.

  • Kamil (unregistered) in reply to bobday

    Yup: it's a PNC Bank ATM. Whose website I was just using to check whether I'd been paid this week... I'll be going down there to close down my account with them this afternoon.

    Captcha: stinky. Just like that ATM's code.

  • Zygo (unregistered)

    I have visions of a back room somewhere with a web camera pointed at a vintage amber monochrome display driven by a very dusty HGA card, with the web camera's output in the Staten Island ferry office...

    Obviously the trendy restaurant caters to terrorists. Why else would it be named "interror"? I suppose it could be named after people who work at cemetaries (people who inter, or interrors, although my Yankee references say it should be spelled "interrer" if it's a word at all).

    I've seen bank machines stuck in a failed OS/2 boot (looked like a disk failure took out the bank machine application, but not the command prompt or the rest of the OS runtime). The keypad keys produced numbers which appeared on the command line, but I couldn't find any way to simulate Alt or otherwise get anything executed. To be 100% fair, the machine I was able to interact with was a bankbook updater, a non-money-dispensing machine located near the bank machines that can print statements in your bankbook, but it's pretty similar technology--same kiosk except the money dispenser is replaced with a printer.

  • wondering (unregistered)

    Did these errors occur when OS/2 was used to run things ?

  • weee (unregistered) in reply to wondering

    lol, this is awesome!

  • atm user (unregistered) in reply to wondering

    You can see where this is going...

    Soon, ATM keyboards will have ctrl, alt and del keys, and preferably one labeled "Any"

  • 0x15e (unregistered)

    I think ASP.NET is fantastic but it completely blows my mind that anyone would think it's a good idea for ATM software. Windows forms, maybe, but ASP.NET, no.

  • afeaewf (unregistered) in reply to wondering
    wondering:
    Did these errors occur when OS/2 was used to run things ?

    No. There were other errors that happened though.

    Whatever idiot decided to shoehorn ASP.NET into an ATM front end deserves to die.

    God I hate developers that only understand "The Web".

  • Gareth (unregistered)

    I don't know about anyone else, but I'd never eat/drink at a bar called "In Terror"

  • SomeCoder (unregistered) in reply to afeaewf
    afeaewf:
    Whatever idiot decided to shoehorn ASP.NET into an ATM front end deserves to die.

    God I hate developers that only understand "The Web".

    Agree 100%

  • Regales Prime (unregistered)

    For some of the less fancy ATMs, BlankButton+1 still works :)

    Hold the button (on the keypad) with no markings, and hit the number one, and watch as the admin console comes up. Probably won't work on the fancy new ATMs running ASP.NET, but judging from the error, they shouldn't be too hard to get into.

  • despair (unregistered)

    I like you make sure that the manufacturer's signature plate is in the photo. We need to know who to thank for these errors.

  • (cs) in reply to afeaewf
    afeaewf:
    Whatever idiot decided to shoehorn ASP.NET into an ATM front end deserves to die.

    God I hate developers that only understand "The Web".

    It was probably a buzzword dropping PHB's idea.

  • Christophe (unregistered) in reply to 0x15e
    0x15e:
    I think ASP.NET is fantastic but it completely blows my mind that anyone would think it's a good idea for ATM software. Windows forms, maybe, but ASP.NET, no.

    It probably eases the use of Access as the Bank's backend.

  • (cs) in reply to Christophe
    Christophe:
    It probably eases the use of Access as the Bank's backend.

    Access back end is ok; ATM is only used by one person at a time!

    In fact, why not have a seperate Access database for each card issued, using the PIN as the database password. You could store the databases in folders on a file share with each of the digits of the card as the folder name therefore enforcing a simple folder structure...

  • (cs) in reply to Martin
    Martin:
    Access back end is ok; ATM is only used by one person at a time!

    In fact, why not have a seperate Access database for each card issued, using the PIN as the database password. You could store the databases in folders on a file share with each of the digits of the card as the folder name therefore enforcing a simple folder structure...

    Hell, why stop there; let google host the file share so that all of the banks can access the data - the perfect cash network!

  • (cs) in reply to Steve
    Steve:
    I can almost understand an ATM running ASP.Net, but the fact that it's has remote error display turned on ?
    I've seen this message on Microsoft.com, mts.ru and beeline.ru (the largest cellphone providers in Russia).
  • Andrew (unregistered) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    Get in there Diebold! Doesn't exactly make you feel happy about all those closed-source voting machines, eh?

    Diebold just wants you to vote with your pocketbook.

  • (cs) in reply to freelancer
    freelancer:
    Heh, I've seen ATMs BSODing. Windows 95 style. I also got a nice userfriendly message once: "There are only $50 bills left." My choices were "Yes" and "No". I still wonder what would have happened had I clicked "No".
    It's an official permission to open the ATM, check the bills inside it and answer the question *honestly*. Reminds me of a local newspaper vending machine: two cardboard boxes glued together. You put the money in Box 1 and take a newspaper from Box 2. At least it's eco-friendly!
  • (cs) in reply to zlogic
    zlogic:
    freelancer:
    Heh, I've seen ATMs BSODing. Windows 95 style. I also got a nice userfriendly message once: "There are only $50 bills left." My choices were "Yes" and "No". I still wonder what would have happened had I clicked "No".
    It's an official permission to open the ATM, check the bills inside it and answer the question *honestly*. Reminds me of a local newspaper vending machine: two cardboard boxes glued together. You put the money in Box 1 and take a newspaper from Box 2. At least it's eco-friendly!
    In that case, where's the "Now there are only $50 bills left" option?
  • st0p (unregistered) in reply to freelancer
    freelancer:
    Heh, I've seen ATMs BSODing. Windows 95 style. I also got a nice userfriendly message once: "There are only $50 bills left." My choices were "Yes" and "No". I still wonder what would have happened had I clicked "No".

    i've seen an ATM starting up dr. watson once...

  • jkndrkn (unregistered)

    Whoops, looks like I forgot to wipe the XML off of my debit card.

  • rewt (unregistered)

    I've personally worked with Diebold ATM's, and I suspect the ASP.NET error is probably from a web page to display advertisements while the ATM sits idle. Last time I worked with them (about 1 1/2 years ago), they didn't use any .NET or ASP.NET.

    The thing more scary than using ASP.NET for anything on an ATM is the fact that Diebold ATM's run Windows XP. In general, the whole idea is a nightmare (as experienced by Bank of America a few years back when they lost thousands of ATM's due to worm-du-jour spread from their corporate network). We made sure to put the ATM's on a secured subnet, firewalled, and locked down from even our transaction processor's network. I still didn't trust them, though. The old OS/2 ATM's we ran were rock solid, but couldn't handle 3DES - which was required by end of 2005 for pin-pad encryption, replacing DES as the standard (another scary thing).

    captcha: craaazy, which is what you must be to run an ATM on Windows.

  • samic (unregistered)

    Waoh! ATM with ASP.NET! Awesome!

    Now only if they add Silverlight in the app and my banking circle of life will be completed.

  • kettch (unregistered)

    There is a Bank of America ATM in a local Costco that I use once in a while. The first time I used it, I froze for several seconds looking for a problem after I hit the first option.

    Every press of the onscreen buttons was acknowledged by the standard error sound "ding". Whenever there was a prompt that required input, it played the "dunk" sound. Every time I use that thing, I end up twitching through the whole process.

  • AdT (unregistered)

    The last one is not a bug - the user just tried to vote for Kerry. His name and address had been logged and a government team was sent to fix him.

    (Yes, I know this is an ATM, not a voting machine, yadda yadda.)

  • (cs)

    On the way to work once, I popped into a newsagents to use the ATM. It was showing a Windows 98 desktop with lots of suspicious icons in the taskbar. I left.

    On another, I asked for 40 euro, at which it displayed the following message: "This machine can only dispense multiples of 50. The maximum this machine can dispense is 120".

    Finally, one down the road (a proper ATM this time, not a newsagent one) says "Application starting" for about a minute after you insert your card, then continues as normal.

  • (cs) in reply to st0p
    st0p:
    freelancer:
    Heh, I've seen ATMs BSODing. Windows 95 style. I also got a nice userfriendly message once: "There are only $50 bills left." My choices were "Yes" and "No". I still wonder what would have happened had I clicked "No".

    i've seen an ATM starting up dr. watson once...

    I have seen an ATM booting Windows NT 4.0 and going through login scripts. Then I asked a friend which works in the same bank, and he said that this is not uncommon at all.

  • Paul Holt (unregistered)

    In a crowded airport I noticed that a whole series of flight schedule monitors was showing blue screen of death.

    "Oh look, it's crashed," I said, pointing out the monitors to my wife. She made the very good point that this comment was NOT what one should say in a crowded airport amongst people waiting for incoming flights.

  • (cs) in reply to vt_mruhlin
    vt_mruhlin:
    afeaewf:
    Whatever idiot decided to shoehorn ASP.NET into an ATM front end deserves to die.

    God I hate developers that only understand "The Web".

    It was probably a buzzword dropping PHB's idea.

    Nope. Customer requirement (the banks being the customer of the ATM maker).

    I've worked on programming ATMs and they ALL run Windows (well, there might still be some OS/2 machines around), and they ALL use webpages displayed on Internet Explorer as frontend. The rationale for the latter is that it allows the bank to customize how the frontend looks. Stupid, I know, but it's apparently quite impossible to sell an ATM that does not have a tick mark next to "easy customization of frontend look via HTML".

  • (cs)

    Come on people, an ATM is supposed to be in the category of a mission critical device. It shouldn't have the possibility of failure. At the worst case, if errors occur, it should go back to the main screen after informing the user that something was wrong. Geez, what happened to testing. Considering the fact that it was after a card swipe, it seems like it might be a parsing error (or lookup error for customer)

  • Asd (unregistered)

    Is the first ATM using Flash? It is probably flash inside IE 6 on Windows XP.

  • Michael (unregistered) in reply to Andrew
    Andrew:
    Anonymous:
    Get in there Diebold! Doesn't exactly make you feel happy about all those closed-source voting machines, eh?

    Diebold just wants you to vote with your pocketbook.

    Diebold just wants to vote with your pocketbook.

    There, I fixed it for you.

  • Seventh-Monkey (unregistered)

    I've seen ATMs here in England with BSODs and with the good ol' "the" memory could "not be" "read".

  • Artifice (unregistered)

    The schedule channel for the cable provider (eastlink) in my area (Nova Scotia, Canada), once showed a win98 BSOD of death for a while. I'm not sure how big an area was affected, but it was funny. This was a few years ago.

    A similar thing happened to a bus schedule display at a bus stop, except that it was only showing the default windows9x desktop.

  • Midnight Voyager (unregistered)

    Reminds me of how I found out that the airport e-ticket terminals ran Windows XP last week. They had to be rebooted. headdesk Glad I got there early...

  • David (unregistered)

    ROFL at that last one!!!

    I do web development in ASP.NET, and that error is nothing new to me... but to see that at an ATM!!!!!! that would be so hilarious!!

  • blah (unregistered)

    OMFGWTFHROTFLMAOBBQ-LOL

    I wonder if this happens anywhere else...

  • Fred Garvin (unregistered) in reply to Gareth
    Gareth:
    I don't know about anyone else, but I'd never eat/drink at a bar called "In Terror"

    Then the sign works, now people like you won't eat there, maybe I'll give it a try.

  • Joe (unregistered) in reply to David

    Heh, I actually work for PNC Bank, and that sure is one of our ATMs. When they go down, they normally don't say that. They give a nice customer friendly screen that says something along the lines of "Down For Maintenance: Sorry for this Inconvenience." Anyway, if there was a problem with the ATM, you can easily get your money back by filling out a Reg E claim form.

    As for Windows: We use Windows XP for everything. Of course, the ATM doesn't use ASP.net. Although I personally do not work on the ATMs, I know how they work and what was used to make them. Trust me, those ATMs are a lot more secure than that screen makes it appear to be. That was most likely a freak accident. Plus, like it was said above, the ATMs actually do not belong to PNC, but to Diebold, a third party company. So don't blame PNC, blame Diebold.

  • X (unregistered)

    heh, the departures/arrivals screen in the detroit airport was experiencing a fatal error when I was there several weeks ago.

  • Pádraig Brady (unregistered)
  • (cs)

    The restaurant 'In Terror' looks more like a place with pokie machines to me. It looks like it's in Czech Republic, and they always have the current jackpot displayed outside.

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