July 19, 2024 – A widespread IT outage has impacted several global institutions, including hospitals, major banks, media outlets, and airlines, causing significant disruptions in their services on Friday. The outage has affected international airports in India, Hong Kong, the UK, Japan, Germany, Switzerland, Czech Republic and the US, leading to grounded flights and delays.
Emergency services have also been hit hard, with some hospitals cancelling surgeries and the state of Alaska warning that its 911 system might be unavailable.
The cyber security firm Crowdstrike confirmed that the worldwide outage was caused by a defective software update for its Microsoft Windows hosts. “The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed,” the company stated, assuring that it was not a cyberattack.
They also recommended that organisations communicate with CrowdStrike representatives through official channels.
Earlier in the day, Microsoft posted an update on its 365 service, stating that it was investigating an issue impacting users’ ability to access various Microsoft 365 apps and services.
The IT outage has caused chaos across various sectors. Many broadcast networks in Australia scrambled on air as systems failed, with Sky News UK going completely off air before resuming broadcasts.
Supermarkets were also affected, with payment systems down and images from Australia showing Coles supermarket’s self-checkout tills closed. Hospitals in Germany, Israel, and the UK reported disruptions, impacting GP services as well.
Travel plans worldwide have been thrown into disarray. Airports across Europe, the US, and Southeast Asia reported system failures, forcing passengers to manually complete processes typically handled by machines.
International Airport in Delhi, India, where boarding passes and check-in bag stickers were processed by hand. Hong Kong’s Airport Authority stated that the outage affected some global airlines at Hong Kong International Airport, leading to manual check-ins, though flight operations were not impacted.
In the US, airlines United, Delta, and American Airlines issued a “global ground stop” on all flights, while Australian carriers Virgin and Jetstar delayed or cancelled flights.
Aviation analytics firm Cirium reported that more than 1,000 flights were cancelled worldwide due to the outages. Airports in Tokyo, Berlin, Prague, and Zurich were also affected, with Zurich airport halting incoming flights.
An Australian home affairs ministry spokesperson confirmed that the outage appeared to be related to an issue at a cyber-security firm. The country’s cybersecurity watchdog stated there was no information to suggest a malicious attack. “Our current information is this outage relates to a technical issue with a third-party software platform employed by affected companies,” they said in a statement.
While Alaskan officials reported that many 911 and non-emergency call centers were not functioning properly, Australian authorities confirmed that triple-0 call centers, the main emergency contact in the country, were not affected.
