[HN Gopher] The Fed Is Down
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The Fed Is Down
Author : justinzollars
Score : 114 points
Date : 2021-02-24 19:19 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (mobile.reuters.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (mobile.reuters.com)
| justinzollars wrote:
| https://frbservices.org/app/status/serviceStatus.do
| latchkey wrote:
| .do is struts, well known for a myriad of security holes.
|
| https://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/9907/in-a-uri...
|
| https://doublepulsar.com/apache-struts-and-the-three-leading...
| justinzollars wrote:
| Affected Areas: Account Services, Check 21, Check Adjustments,
| FedACH, FedLine Advantage, FedLine Command, FedLine Direct,
| FedLine Web, Fedwire Funds, Fedwire Securities, National
| Settlement
| schraeds wrote:
| About 3/4 of services seem to be back up now, including ACH
| justinzollars wrote:
| yup. Looks like things are quickly being resolved.
| kemofo wrote:
| The irony of name "Federal Reserve" is that there is nothing
| Federal about it. The Fed is a completely autonomous private
| organization which controls the United States money supply.
| umeshunni wrote:
| That's an adorable meme that crypto-bros like to tweet, but
| really they are actually an agency of the federal government
| and answerable to Congress.
|
| From https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/about_14986.htm
|
| Who owns the Federal Reserve?
|
| The Federal Reserve System is not "owned" by anyone. The
| Federal Reserve was created in 1913 by the Federal Reserve Act
| to serve as the nation's central bank. The Board of Governors
| in Washington, D.C., is an agency of the federal government and
| reports to and is directly accountable to the Congress.
| goodluckchuck wrote:
| I think it's fair to question the wisdom (and legality) of
| agencies (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_agencies_
| of_the_Un...) that are "independent" of the constitution's
| separation of powers.
|
| The constitution vests Judicial power in an independent
| judiciary, but provides that the POTUS shall be elected and
| that executive power shall be vested in him/her... and that
| legislative power shall be vested in Congress, with
| Representatives and Senators elected by the people.
|
| To say that there are agencies that are simply outside of
| that system... it seems to fly in the face of the basic
| things that kids learn in Elementary school.
|
| The Department of Defense (aka military) takes their orders
| from the POTUS / Commander in Chief. We should freak if the
| military went rogue and decided to invade a country without
| approval. Yet, we're supposed to want other executive
| departments to act without regard to the wishes of the
| elected president?
|
| > [The FED] is an agency of the federal government and
| reports to and is directly accountable to the Congress.
|
| I mean, it sounds as if they're claiming to be a Legislative
| Branch agency.
| unishark wrote:
| There are plenty of agencies under the president who need
| to be as independent as possible of day-to-day control by
| politicians. Especially in law enforcement.
|
| Not great if you consider democracy to the be a universally
| good thing of which more is always better. But it really
| isn't true. The majority can do good or bad things.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| "Independent" agencies are not independent of the
| separation of powers. They are "independent" within the
| executive branch in that their leadership does not serve at
| the pleasure of the President, is allocated under law by a
| process designed to provide some viewpoint diversity
| despite being appointed by the President and confirmed by
| the Senate, and their leadership can typically only be
| dismissed for cause, and their power is assigned by law not
| delegated from above them within the executive branch. They
| also tend to be delegated either or both quasi-judicial or
| quasi-legislatove powers by Congress (which also happens to
| non-independent agencies.)
|
| > To say that there are agencies that are simply outside of
| that system... it seems to fly in the face of the basic
| things that kids learn in Elementary school.
|
| In every field, the basic things that kids learn in
| elementary school tend to be incomplete or wrong, and
| government is definitely no exception, but independent
| agencies are not outside the system.
|
| > I mean, it sounds as if they're claiming to be a
| Legislative Branch agency.
|
| No, accountability to Congress is not exclusive to
| legislative branch agencies.
| trident5000 wrote:
| lol "crypto-bros" that claim has been around way longer than
| crypto has been popular. I get the crypto hate since its
| taking big tech power away and your jobs. Good luck.
| granzymes wrote:
| A completely autonomous organization that...
|
| 1) was created by Congress
|
| 2) is accountable to Congress
|
| 3) has governors that are paid by Congress
|
| 4) has governors appointed by the President
| fl0wenol wrote:
| Look, kid, so it's not a cabinet level department in the
| executive branch or anything.
|
| It's little PCAOB, and a little Post Office. Point being it's
| not autonomous nor private.
| dragontamer wrote:
| https://engineering.gusto.com/how-ach-works-a-developer-pers...
|
| A good time to remind people that the USA's money-transfer system
| (aka: ACH) is a giant Rube-Goldberg machine involving FTP
| transfers of specially formatted files.
|
| So it sounds like the Fed's FTP server is down?? Or something
| like that?
| efficax wrote:
| Some of the first software I ever wrote for pay was a daily
| shell script that pgp encrypted an ACH batch and sent it from
| one financial institution to another over a dedicated frame-
| link, via FTP. This was over 20 years ago! Can't believe it's
| still the same.
| aksss wrote:
| We had to write jobs to encrypt the NACHA files and send over
| FTP years ago, but I was at the same company long enough
| (prior to 2010) to see the banks at least adopt SFTP.
| Slightly better, but still encrypted the files. Hey, it works
| and is reliable. I learned banks are really cheap, though,
| definitely not in the mood to spend money on new
| systems/processes even if they'd improve productivity.
| cout wrote:
| Sounds like bliss! Twenty years ago I was working on a
| project that received financial data through a Y-cable
| connected to a printer port. One day, we stopped getting data
| and could not figure out why. Turns out the printer had run
| out of paper.
| agumonkey wrote:
| > involving FTP transfers of specially formatted files.
|
| during my internship, a big healthcare representative came at
| the company to ask for help about their IT system. Turns out it
| was mass FTP transfer. I was silent for a few minutes thinking
| hospital networks relied on this.
| throwawayboise wrote:
| It's OK, customers can use the backup system which is sending
| in 9-track tape reels via FedEx.
| toomim wrote:
| Fedwire is not ACH. Those are different systems.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fedwire
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACH_Network
|
| Fedwire is a much faster, more modern system than ACH. You can
| only access it if you are a bank, though. ACH is available to
| anyone, but it's old and uses FTP.
|
| There are also a faster modernized next-day and same-day
| versions of ACH available as of the last few years. I haven't
| checked out their protocols, though, to see if they still use
| FTP.
| [deleted]
| ohiovr wrote:
| Why wouldn't they use SFTP?
| sodality2 wrote:
| Meet the US government... Triple DES is still used for
| backwards compatibility in banking
| dragontamer wrote:
| The Fed is a private entity actually.
|
| The Treasury is US Government. But the Fed is owned by the
| member banks. The US kinda coopted a seat at their table
| and Congress + President appoints the Fed head. But
| otherwise, the rest of the board is made up by private
| companies.
| smitty1e wrote:
| >The Fed is a private entity actually.
|
| The idea of the Federal Reserve urinates all over the
| Constitutional principle that people weilding power stand
| for election.
|
| Doom on us for permitting such.
| Meekro wrote:
| Calling the Fed a private entity is really misleading. It
| was created by an act of Congress and its highest ranking
| officials, the Board of Governors, are all appointed by
| the President.
|
| Yes, it shares some power with the banks it regulates
| (who can elect representatives), but the US government
| didn't "coopt a seat at the table." It built the table
| and had most of the seats from the start.
|
| And it's true that member banks own stock in the Fed, but
| it's a super-funky kind of stock ownership. That stock
| can't be sold or traded, and doesn't grant the kind of
| voting rights one normally associates with stock
| ownership. It only entitles the stockholder to their
| share of the dividends the Fed pays every year. The Fed
| actually returns nearly all of its profits (something
| like 95%) to the US Treasury, and pays the rest as
| dividends to shareholder banks.
| jerry1979 wrote:
| Correct me if I'm wrong, but people constructed a
| cleavage between the Fed and the US Govt because they
| thought we shouldn't trust democracy with money creation.
| dragontamer wrote:
| The proper role of the US Government and Money has been
| under debate ever since Hamilton was appointed Treasury
| Secretary under George Washington. (EDIT: actually, even
| earlier than that, but the country didn't exist yet...)
|
| Jefferson wanted one system, Hamilton wanted another. And
| the two sides have been arguing for the past 200+ years.
| Sometimes, the central bank appears, sometimes it
| disappears. Then silver+gold, then removal of the silver
| standard (gold-only standard), then etc. etc. etc.
|
| The Revolutionary War required money and bonds.
| Immediately upon the end of that war came the question of
| how to organize and pay those loans. Should it be held by
| the states? Or by the national government? Should a
| central bank even exist, or is a loose collection of
| banks good enough? Should there be a national currency,
| or should the States make their own currency? The
| Continental Congress's dollar was hit severely by
| inflation: losing 99% of its value in just a decade or
| so. Not a big deal: most Americans used Spanish Pesos
| back then due to their reliable silver weight.
|
| The money issue was front-and-center at the birth of this
| country. Lots of debate and discussion (and duels!!)
| occurred over the issue. Arguing about money (literally
| to death) is a proud American tradition.
| Meekro wrote:
| You're right-- the Fed Board of Governors members are
| appointed by the President for 14-year terms, which is
| supposed to make them more independent.
|
| I'd say that what you're describing isn't limited to just
| fears about money creation, though. It's part of the
| broader notion in most Western democracies that permanent
| (or semi-permanent) bureaucrats are more trustworthy than
| elected officials. It's not just the Fed: Presidents who
| tamper with the Department of Justice too much, for
| example, are often criticized for intruding on its
| "independence."
|
| This notion has both practical problems-- who can fire an
| "independent" bureaucrat run amok?-- and constitutional
| problems-- the Constitution says "the Executive power is
| vested in the President" and makes no allowances for
| _any_ Executive power to be wielded outside the President
| 's control. The Supreme Court has been known to remind
| everyone of this fact when it's forgotten. For example,
| the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has a director
| who is appointed by the President for a 5 year term, and
| can only be fired for a narrow list of reasons. The
| Supreme Court struck down that restriction and said,
| roughly, that any inquiry into _why_ the President is
| firing a particular bureaucrat would infringe on the
| Executive power that is vested in the President alone.
|
| Nonetheless, this idea that some power is "too dangerous
| to be wielded by elected officials" is alive and well,
| like with the Federal Reserve. It just can't be wielded
| _too far_ from the President-- and yes, the President can
| remove members of the Fed Board of Governors, though it
| isn 't commonly done.
| natchy wrote:
| Yes created by an act of Congress but is not under the
| jurisdiction of congress or the president, apart from
| appointments.
| Meekro wrote:
| The Fed is _completely_ under the US government 's
| control. Congress created it by passing a law, and could
| pass another law to restructure it if they ever wanted
| to. The President fills the Board of Governors who run it
| with his chosen nominees, and can remove and replace them
| at will. How much more "jurisdiction" do you want?
| gruez wrote:
| It's probably VPNed and/or FTP over TLS (aka FTPS).
| xtracto wrote:
| No, these things use SFTP which is mainly ssh over 22
| gruez wrote:
| anecdotal counter-evidence:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7647166
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7638063
|
| This is probably because people often conflate SFTP (ssh-
| based protocol) with FTPS (FTP over TLS) eg. royal bank
| which says "secure ftp" (which suggests SFTP), but also
| mentions SSL (which suggests FTPS).
|
| https://www.rbcroyalbank.com/ach/cid-212563.html
| lrem wrote:
| Don't touch if it isn't broken?
|
| From what I've seen in other countries, you don't update
| protocols for this. You introduce better ones and kill the
| old ones once nobody used them for a while. Which might take
| longer than expected, because "free instant transfers" might
| be seen as cannibalizing the "slightly less slow expensive
| transfers" any given bank might have on offer.
| xtracto wrote:
| I deal with the ACH network on a daily basis and let me
| tell you it IS broken. The fact that you only receive
| negative ack when a transaction fails, otherwise you have
| to pray your transaction went through is so bad it sounds
| like a joke.
|
| For comparison, the third world underdeveloped country
| where I live has an electronic cash transfer system
| allowing me to send ANY amount of money in 10 minutes at
| most for $0.5 usd.
| throwaway20875 wrote:
| I worked in fintech in NYC for a bit. The technology
| driving most critical financial infrastructure in the US
| is astoundingly antiquated. It is only sustained through
| the sheer amount of bodies and ingenuity thrown at it.
| [deleted]
| avereveard wrote:
| > FTP transfers of specially formatted files.
|
| there's nothing wrong with that, at least it isn't fake-rest,
| and most other delivery technology are proprietary anyway.
| aksss wrote:
| Reddit appears down right now as well with 503 errors..
| coincidence?
| bostonsre wrote:
| Anyone know what the fed uptime was for last year? Or how common
| these types of issues are for the fed? Sounds like a massive
| impact if they normally move ~$3.4 trillion a day..
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| https://www.frbservices.org/resources/financial-services/ach...
|
| Target uptime for the last eight years is 99.85% (ACH service
| availability), exceeded in all years going back to 2012.
| Couldn't find a FedWire (which was also down) quality stats
| page, but I'd expect similar uptime targets and measured
| quality.
| justinzollars wrote:
| It's huge. This is a big story
| schraeds wrote:
| Happened towards end of 2019, didn't seem to have a big
| impact on anything...
| https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-19/fed-
| says-...
| tibbydudeza wrote:
| We used to send/receive magnetic tapes via plane for interbank
| settlements since our data center was located in a different
| province to all of the other major banks.
|
| Now there is a real-time settlement system for the entire
| country.
| andrewmcwatters wrote:
| Man, I know there's a real joke here about ACH and FTP, but the
| older I get, the better I feel about systems that are almost too
| simple to a fault.
|
| I'd rather have that and deal with its limitations than try and
| stomach what passes for modern engineering these days.
|
| Some solutions I see these days should be considered criminally
| negligent if they were to be used in any HA environments for
| governments, health care organizations, or similar bodies.
| anandsuresh wrote:
| Obligatory "Bitcoin would solve this!" post. :)
| krupan wrote:
| https://www.buybitcoinworldwide.com/bitcoin-uptime/
| zhoujianfu wrote:
| "The Bitcoin network has been functional for 99.9861136495 %
| of the time since its inception on Jan 3 2009 02:54:25 GMT"
|
| ...for certain definitions of "functional".
| aminozuur wrote:
| I suspect this wouldn't be that big of a headline, if it weren't
| for crypto-kiddies seeing it as an argument for crypto.
| silexia wrote:
| This is what happens when government runs areas of the economy.
| Private companies can go bankrupt when they get obsolete, but
| government agencies have massive political pull and are never
| dismantled. The nation that can figure out a bankruptcy process
| for government agencies will be the leader in future centuries.
| droffel wrote:
| The Federal Reserve _is_ a private company.
| ryanmarsh wrote:
| It's not surprising how many people aren't aware of that.
| When you look at the ceremony around the chair and reports to
| congress, when you read Wikipedia articles, it sounds as if
| we have a government owned central bank when in fact we have
| a private entity with distributed and opaque governance which
| is ostensibly accountable to the congress although I've not
| seen congress ever act like it has any accountability for fed
| behavior.
| billiam wrote:
| Not true. Congress passed the Federal Reserve Act and
| assigns to the Board the implementation of it and
| regulations that are written down in the Code of Federal
| Regulations. And the Chair is confirmed in the Senate of
| course.
| insertnickname wrote:
| Yes, but not really.
| boredumb wrote:
| It's a private company in name only. It was enacted through
| congress with a board of directors that are actually a
| federal government agency. Saying it's a private company is
| not even technically true.
|
| It's gluing feathers to my iguana and calling it a bird.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Their uptime stats seem pretty reasonable to me, exceeding
| their target uptime in almost all cases.
|
| https://www.frbservices.org/resources/financial-services/ach...
| capableweb wrote:
| Am I the only one surprised that some of their targets don't
| even have 3 nines as availability? That's some pretty crazy
| stuff when it comes to how serious the context is and
| considering the availability of cryptocurrency transactions.
| tfehring wrote:
| Would be interested in seeing the 99.9%ile execution time
| for BTC vs FedACH transactions. The page linked in the
| parent comment provides statistics for "timely" processing
| but doesn't indicate the actual time(s) that that standard
| represents. My money's still on the Fed though.
| capableweb wrote:
| > Would be interested in seeing the 99.9%ile execution
| time for BTC vs FedACH transactions
|
| You mean like account to account transactions? Doesn't
| ACH transactions take "up to 3 business days" or
| something silly like that? I can't really find any
| average numbers either as none of the data is being made
| public.
|
| The transactions speed for one block in Bitcoin has been
| at max ~30 minutes, you might require up to N amount of
| blocks depending on your use case. So 10 blocks (safe)
| would be 5 hours, available 24/7 (granted you have
| internet access).
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Yes. That'd be quibbling over a few hours per year [1] in
| availability. No system can be expected to deliver 100%
| uptime.
|
| I have associates involved in mortgage lending. Anyone who
| was waiting to close based on a wire was told to just
| reschedule for tomorrow.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_availability#Percent
| age_c...
| capableweb wrote:
| > That'd be quibbling over a few hours per year
|
| From your own source:
|
| 99% ("two nines") - Per Day - 14.40 minutes
|
| 99.9% ("three nines") - Per Day - 1.44 minutes
|
| If you do multiple transfers per day, the difference is
| non negligible. Especially if you rely on it for critical
| transfers.
|
| > No system can be expected to deliver 100% uptime.
|
| Of course not, hence we're talking about the amount of
| nines, not if the uptime is perfect.
|
| > Anyone who was waiting to close based on a wire was
| told to just reschedule for tomorrow.
|
| Indeed, doesn't that suck? Why can't it finish in at
| least hours if not minutes?
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(page generated 2021-02-24 23:01 UTC)