UK supermarket scales go 404 on shoppers
- ID
- 18053
- Status
- summarized
- Published
- 26 Aug 2026, 6:00 PM
- Fetched
- 26 Aug 2026, 6:30 PM
- Provider
- The Register
- Category
- technology
- Original URL
- https://www.theregister.com/offbeat/2026/08/26/uk-supermarket-scales-go-404-on-shoppers/5292088
- Source URL
- https://www.theregister.com/headlines.atom
Summary
- Score
- 2.0
- Created
- 26 Aug 2026, 6:30 PM
- Tags
- Audience
- developers
What happened
A Tesco store in Coventry had Avery Berkel XT-series produce scales displaying HTTP-style error codes (404 and 403) on their touchscreens, likely running Linux with 2-8GB RAM. The scales also show video ads to increase basket value, and the 403 unit displayed a plea for human intervention with its label feed.
Why it matters
Minimal practical takeaway; this is an offbeat bork column, not an incident write-up with root cause or remediation. At most it's a reminder that embedded Linux point-of-sale devices with touchscreens and ad-serving are now common enough in retail that their failure modes look like web server errors.
Discussion angle
A quick laugh segment: what the proliferation of Linux-based touchscreen scales means for retail maintenance, and whether HTTP-style error codes on embedded devices help or confuse store staff.