KATHMANDU, July 19: A massive global IT failure on Friday caused widespread disruptions, grounding planes, interrupting TV coverage, and affecting banks, hospitals, and financial markets. The failure led to flight delays worldwide, card machine breakdowns, a pause in news updates from the London Stock Exchange, and Sky News going off air.
According to news agencies' reports, airports saw long queues, with airlines such as Turkish Airlines, Air France, KLM, Delta, and Ryanair among those impacted at major hubs in Berlin, London, and Amsterdam during the peak of the summer travel season. Dubai International Airport reported normal operations despite check-in problems for some airlines. The UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs advised against making transactions as its electronic systems were affected.
The chaos, stretching from Australia to North America, was traced to a cybersecurity company called CrowdStrike, whose software runs on Microsoft computers. CrowdStrike’s president, George Kurtz, stated that the issue stemmed from a defect in a Microsoft update, clarifying that it was not a security incident or cyber attack. The defect has been identified, isolated, and a fix deployed, according to news agencies.
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The UAE's Telecommunications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority confirmed the technical defect and advised against updates or downloads of CrowdStrike software until the issue is resolved. The UAE Cyber Security Council also recommended updating Google Chrome browsers to the latest version.
Cybersecurity experts described the cause as a faulty update to the CrowdStrike Falcon software, which monitors computers for threats. They have emphasized the need for careful update deployment practices.
Microsoft acknowledged the issue, which was affecting Windows devices due to an update from a third-party software platform. They anticipated a forthcoming resolution.
CrowdStrike’s faulty update affected only Windows software, leaving Mac and Linux users unaffected. Both companies’ shares were down, though traders remained generally calm.
The disruption caused various problems worldwide including service issues with Visa and Amazon, affecting supermarkets and currency exchanges in Hong Kong, impacts on critical infrastructure, with two hospitals canceling elective operations. Some UK doctors were unable to make appointments, and emergency call centers were down in Alaska. Reports said that rail problems compounded travel chaos, with Britain’s largest train company warning of disruptions due to widespread IT issues.
It remains unclear if all reported disruptions were linked to CrowdStrike problems, as there were also interruptions to Microsoft’s Azure and Office 365 services. Azure’s cloud platform reported that machines running Windows and CrowdStrike were stuck in a "restarting state" and are currently under investigation.
Russian banks and currency traders experienced fewer problems, attributed to Moscow being partially cut off from global markets under sanctions.
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