COBOL Turns 60. Why It Will Outlive Us All

ZDNet remembers when the only programming languages "were machine and assembler," until Burroughs Corporation programmer Mary Hawes proposed a vendor-neutral language with an English-like vocabulary. (Grace Hopper suggested they approach the Department of Defense, leading to a summit of 41 computer users and manufacturers at the Pentagon in 1959.)

But ZDNet argues that 60 years later, COBOL isn't done yet.

In 2016, the Government Accountability Office reported the Department of Homeland Security, Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Social Security Administration, to name just three, were still using COBOL. According to a COBOL consulting company, which goes by the delightful name, COBOL Cowboys, 200 billion lines of COBOL code are still in use today and 90% of Fortune 500 companies still having COBOL code keeping the lights on. And, if you've received cash out of an ATM recently, it's almost certain COBOL was running behind the scenes.
ZDNet explains that's the largest number of businesses using COBOL are financial institutions, which, according to Micro Focus includes "banking, insurance and wealth management/equities trading. Second is government services (federal, provincial, local)." Micro Focus is the company that now maintains COBOL, and their global director of marketing and "application modernization" tells ZDNet that "the number of organizations running COBOL systems today is in the tens of thousands.
It is impossible to estimate the tens of millions of end users who interface with COBOL-based applications on a daily basis, but the language's reliance is clearly seen with its use in 70 percent of global transaction processing systems. Any time you phone a call center, any time you transfer money, or check your account, or pay a mortgage, or renew or get an insurance quote, or when contacting a government department, or shipping a parcel, or ordering some flowers, or buying something online at a whole range of retailers, or booking a vacation, or a flight, or trading stocks, or even checking your favorite baseball team's seasonal statistics, you are interacting with COBOL.

ZDNet notes that some people are even moving their COBOL applications into the cloud, concluding "At this rate, COBOL programs will outlive us all."