There are many ways for an embedded system to go SNAFU! Anyone out there that can make claims to creating a perfect system on the 1st pass is ... well ... being disingenuous. However, this does not mean that it is OK to let stuff like this go.

As we live in an age where lower cost is always better, and with the inexorable race to the bottom; more stuff like this will happen.

It is a miracle that a lot of stuff out there works. The poor engineering that I have seen go into products is truly astonishing ... and it still appears to work!

The big question I have is:

Why does a low-tech device like a stove have a microprocessor in it???

In my opinion, the main problem is the lack tests by a third-party notified body. There no laws requiring such any longer. Here in Europe for example, such laws were replaced by the huge fiasco known as the CE mark, which means that the manufacturer guarantees that the product follows the appropriate standards. What it does not mean is that the product actually follows said standards.

Ask any salesman if the product he sells will work or not... of course every single company will happily claim such and put some ugly CE letters on it. Even though they may be absolutely clueless of what technical standards their product is supposed to follow. Or even though they are too cheap to pay for a conformance test.

The authorities typically only call for third-party test when serious accidents have happened, and not when the faulty products are released on the market. This is true even for safety-critical equipment: as long as you vouch for your product and write down on a paper that it won't kill people, it is accepted. Even though your product could turn out to be a doomsday device in reality. No matter the nature of the application, it is really too late to start dealing with the problems once the product is in full production.

The solution is simple: enforce a third-party review of all technical standards applying to the product. The governments should not only list a number of standards as they do today, they should also make sure that all products released live up to the standards.

I wear an insulin pump that has a small transciever built in to accept readings from my blood glucose meter and to send out a verification that it read the meter correctly. Sometimes when going through the security devices at store entrances and exits, the security device gets triggered. I've never seen any changes to settings in the meter though.

I've also seen products exposed to the effects of personal defense products i.e. tasers that are built to look like cell phones. These generate a high voltage that makes the standard ESD 4KV or 8KV test look like a love tap.