>The article cites “mechanical systems” as being infallible, and reading that language, it reads to me as some archaic legislation that never got updated for computer software.
It's worse than that.
The law was fixed in 1984[0] and then the fix was intentionally reversed in 1999.[1]
[0] https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1984/60/section/69/1991...