Worldwide IT Breakdown Halts Flights, Interrupts Banking Services, and Causes Media Blackout
Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike has confirmed that a massive internet outage on July 19 was caused by a defect in a Windows software update, and they have deployed a fix for the issue. They clarified that it was not a security incident or cyberattack.
The outage led to IT problems for major global institutions, affecting airports, banks’ apps, media outlets, supermarkets, and other businesses.
Airports in several countries reported IT system problems, leading to grounded flights by major airlines like American, Delta, United, and Allegiant Air. Europe’s largest airline, Ryanair, also experienced issues with its booking system.
Businesses worldwide reported difficulties in processing digital payments due to the outage.
Microsoft acknowledged and was addressing issues with its cloud platform, Azure, which impacted services and applications.
CrowdStrike’s CEO, George Kurtz, assured customers that the problem was isolated to a content update for Windows hosts and that Mac and Linux systems were not affected. He emphasized that it was not a security threat and that a fix had been implemented.
The outage affected various services, including Visa, Mastercard, Microsoft, AWS, banks, airlines, and supermarkets. Microsoft 365 was rerouting traffic to minimize impact and reported an improvement in service availability.
News Channel Knocked Off Air
In the UK, Sky News and CBBC were knocked off air due to the outage. Sky News apologized for the interruption and assured viewers that news was available online and through their app and website.
Other companies, like Govia Thameslink Railway in Britain and booking systems used by doctors, also experienced disruptions. Australian banks, airlines, internet providers, and phone services were among those affected by the outage.
Amazon’s AWS cloud service provider was investigating connectivity issues to Windows EC2 instances and Workspaces within AWS.
PA media contributed to this report.
