Defense Computers: DOD Y2K Functional End-to-End Testing Progress and Test Event Management.

Complete and thorough Year 2000 Y2K testing is essential to provide reasonable assurance that new or modified systems process dates correctly and will not jeopardize an organizations ability to perform core business operations after the millennium. This is especially true for the Department of Defense DOD which relies on a complex and broad array of interconnected computer systems-including weapons, command and control, satellite, inventory management, transportation management, health, financial, personnel and payment systems-to carry out its core business functions and military operations. At your request, we initiated a review of the effectiveness of DODs efforts to perform Year 2000-related end-to-end tests for its major business functions, including Health Affairs, Communications, Personnel, and Logistics. Together, these functional areas are performing thousands of end-to-end tests to ensure that key business processes and systems can continue operating into the year 2000. Specifically, for each functional area, we analyzed reported information on the status and progress of all test events. We also selected and reviewed a critical test event in each functional area to determine whether it was planned and managed in accordance with our Year 2000 testing guide On September 14,1999, we briefed you on the results of our review. This report provides a summary of our briefing and a recommendation to Defense for strengthening oversight of end-to-end testing for the Communications functional area. Subsequent to our briefing, logistics officials submitted additional information on the inclusion of installation telecommunications providers in related test events. We have clarified the briefing slides to reflect this.