CNET

Microsoft suffered a massive, ongoing global IT outage on Friday morning, which is impacting airports, airlines, banks, hospitals and broadcasters around the world. People around the world woke up to technological chaos, with the problem affecting thousands of Windows PCs, which many companies and organizations rely on as part of their critical internet infrastructure. Perhaps most concerning of all, several states across the US have reported that their emergency 911 call centers have been hit.

Microsoft said on X that it was aware of an issue affecting people’s ability to access 365 services late on Thursday. In an update issued around 4 a.m. ET/1 a.m. PT, when it said, “multiple services are continuing to see improvements in availability as our mitigation actions progress.” The company didn’t immediately respond to request for further comment.

The outage, which also took down the London Stock Exchange, has been linked to a faulty update from cybersecurity company CrowdStrike. The company handles the security of many Windows PCs and services around the world. In a statement on Friday morning, Crowdstrike said the issue had been “identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed.”

“This is not a security incident or cyberattack,” the company added.

The last time there was an internet outage this widespread was when a service called Fastly went down in 2021. It’s a reminder of how much of the internet is underpinned by shared infrastructure, which leaves it vulnerable to widespread issues such as this. The share price of many companies took a nose dive following Friday’s outage, but it’s also affected many people on an individual level, from disrupting vacation plans to preventing access to emergency services.

Across the US, state troopers were reporting that 911 lines were down, starting in Alaska. Unconfirmed reports suggest that some lines in Minnesota, Arizona, Indiana Ohio and New Hampshire have also been hit. Many people were reporting issues through the Down Detector website, with outages appearing to peak around midnight PT/3 a.m. ET. If you live in one of the affected states, check with your local state trooper or police department for alternative emergency numbers.

Television channels around the world have been hit by the outage, with Sky News in the UK broadcasting from a phone after its studio equipment failed. The Paris Olympics organizing committee also said it had been hit by the outage, but that it had contingency plans in place.

In the UK, medical services have been affected, including the National Health Service system for booking appointments and pharmacies, which are struggling to take payments. Many non-emergency appointments and procedures have been canceled. As it’s still early in the US, no major issues with healthcare providers or hospitals have been identified at this stage.

Flights grounded: Can I fly today?

Airports from New Zealand to the UK reported issues in the early hours of Friday morning, particularly with their scanning technology, which couldn’t register passengers’ boarding passes. In India and Northern Ireland, departures boards and boarding passes were being written by hand. Airlines, including Europe-wide budget airline Ryanair, were reporting issues with online check-in. Ryanair advised all passengers to arrive at least 3 hours early for their flights.

In the US, the Federal Aviation Authority has grounded some flights from American Airlines, United and Delta. Many airlines in the US haven’t yet issued statements about how they expect the day to pan out, but it might be wise for passengers hoping to fly from US airports today to check with your airlines before setting off and also get there earlier than usual to allow extra time to check-in.

The biggest airlines operating in the US have been issuing regular updates, with Delta saying in a statement: “Delta has resumed some flight departures after a vendor technology issue impacted several airlines and businesses around the world. That issue necessitated a pause in Delta’s global flight schedule this morning while it was addressed.” The airline added that additional cancelations and delays would be expected on Friday, but that it had issued a travel waiver, which would allow passengers scheduled to travel today to rebook their flights for little or no cost, depending on date.

In a statement on X, American Airlines said: “We’re aware of a technology issue with a vendor that is impacting multiple carriers. American is working with the vendor to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.” In an updated statement to CNET it said that as of 5 a.m. ET it had managed to “safely reestablish our operation.”

United Airline issued a statement saying: “A third-party software outage is impacting computer systems worldwide, including at United.” Initially the airline said that it would be holding all flights at their departure points, but later on Friday morning managed to get its flights moving again. “We are resuming some flights but expect schedule disruptions to continue throughout Friday,” said a company spokesperson. “We have issued a waiver to make it easier for customers to change their travel plans via United.com or the United app.”

Dutch airline KLM said that the outage had made flight handling “impossible,” and until the issue was resolved, it largely had to suspend operations. In an update on X, the airline added: “Customers should expect delays and cancellations. We urge passengers to stay away from airport if their flight is not departing or is seriously delayed. We realise this is very inconvenient for customers, particularly because the busy summer holiday season has just started.”

It added that it’s working hard to restore operations and that passengers should keep an eye on KLM.com or the airline’s app for updates.

What is CrowdStrike?

The company at the root of the Microsoft outages isn’t actually Microsoft at all. The source of the issue has been identified as a faulty update issued by cybersecurity company CrowdStrike.

Founded 11 years ago out of Austin, Texas, CrowdStrike is often called in by organizations following major cybersecurity breaches to investigate what went wrong. These include the 2014 Sony Pictures hack and various events targeting the Democratic National Committee between 2015 and 2016.

Many companies around the world rely on CrowdStrike for critical cloud workload protections. In this case, CrowdStrike issued an update for Windows PCs (it confirmed Mac and Linux users hadn’t been affected) that contained a single defect. PCs displayed the “blue screen of death,” indicating a critical error, and were forced into a bootloop, which prevented them from turning on.

Exacerbating the problem further is the fact there doesn’t seem to be a universal, easy fix for the issue. Most impacted PCs will need to be manually reset to an earlier point in time one by one. Until they’re able to turn on, they won’t be able to receive the latest update from CloudStrike. “We refer customers to the support portal for the latest updates and will continue to provide complete and continuous updates on our website,” said a spokesperson for CrowdStrike

“We further recommend organizations ensure they’re communicating with CrowdStrike representatives through official channels,” they added. “Our team is fully mobilized to ensure the security and stability of CrowdStrike customers.”

In an interview with NBC on Friday, CrowdStrike CEO and President George Kurtz said the company was “deeply sorry for the impact that we’ve caused to customers, to travelers, to anyone affected by this.”