The persistence of programming languages such as Cobol, RPG or Visual Basic 6 in the core of key sectors such as banking, insurance or public administration continues to be a reality as extended as worrying. Today, it is estimated that there are more than 800,000 million lines of code in operation worldwide, a figure that illustrates the degree of technological dependence on infrastructure developed decades ago.
Far from being the result of carelessness, this permanence responds to strategic decisions motivated by the reliability that these environments offer in critical contexts. However, high levels of integration into business processes, the difficulty in identifying critical functionalities and the shortage of experts who still dominate these languages are making technological modernization more and more urgent.
On the occasion of World Telecommunications Day and the Information Society, held every May 17, the Technological Consultant Entelgy has identified four major risks that lurk organizations that have not yet addressed the modernization of their Legacy systems.
One of the most worrisome is the loss of technical knowledge, caused by the withdrawal of generations of professionals who developed these systems. “Ignoring the risk of technological legacy does not eliminate the problem, it only posts it by increasing its severity and cost,” they warn from Entelgy.
Entelgy alerts about the consequences of maintaining obsolete systems without a clear transformation strategy
To this is added the difficulty in integrating modern solutions such as APIS, cloud services or artificial intelligence. The lack of technological compatibility not only prevents innovation, but also limits competitiveness in the medium term in an environment where agility and automation are key.
Hidden costs and cybersecurity in question
Although these systems may seem economical because it does not require modern licenses, real operating costs are much higher. Specialized maintenance, difficulties in performing tests and the constant need to apply patches end up shooting the total property cost.
From the point of view of security, the panorama is equally critical. Many Legacy environments do not have updated encryption or robust credential management systems, which makes them an easy target for cyber attacks. According to the report IBM X-Force Threat Intelligence IndexIn 2024, 26% of the gaps in the financial sector occurred in legacy systems without patches.
Digital inheritance: A structural risk for the business
The lack of visibility on the functioning of these environments causes any modification attempt to be a high -risk operation. Not being able to anticipate impacts or evaluate the scope of the changes blocks the evolution of the business and can lead to extreme scenarios such as critical failures without contingency plan.
To face this challenge, Entelgy proposes solutions based on mature technologies, such as automated code analysis tools, artificial intelligence to document ancient systems and progressive modernization models. “There are currently viable alternatives to face this transformation without breaking with what already works,” they conclude from the consultant.
