Major Microsoft outage has caused chaos around the world
Chaos erupted across the globe today (July 19, 2024) as a Microsoft crash wreaked havoc on health, travel, banking and supermarket services. The crisis lasted few hours, however, today’s global IT outage may take “weeks” to resolve as experts told The U.S. Sun that even though an official fix has been released, problems related to the mass IT outage will drag on.
It is very interesting to see how this situation affected the entire world and it makes one question what would occur if our lives would be depending on IT and AI, as the global elites are planning.
Major airports, airlines, railways, banks, hospitals and businesses have been hit by the CrowdStrike issue that sparked international disruption.
HEALTHCARE CHAOS
NHS GP surgeries have confirmed they are unable to access patient records or book appointments.
Britain’s GPs
Practices reported they cannot access the EMIS Web system. EMIS Web is the most widely used clinical system for primary care in the UK. Many appointments needed to be cancelled or rearranged.
The National Pharmacy Association (NPA) also confirmed the IT outage is disrupting community pharmacies.
Global health services affected
There are reports of two German hospitals that have been forced to cancel emergency operations this morning.
The hospitals, in the northern German cities of Luebeck and Kiel, cancelled all elective operations scheduled for today.
Meanwhile, the emergency department of the Scheper hospital in the Netherlands has closed due to a global computer failure.
TRAVEL DISRUPTION
The mega IT outage has also sparked mass train cancellations and delays for passengers travelling this morning.
Train services affected in the UK
National Rail confirmed some train operators are unable to access driver diagrams at certain locations, leading to potential short-notice train cancellations.
Another major railway company, TransPennine Express, told how some TPE stations and systems are having IT issues and suggested travellers buy tickets online.
International disruption
So far there have been reports of New York City’s MTA system being affected by the IT crash.
Commuters on Washington D.C Metro trains are also facing delays.
AIRLINE DELAYS AND CANCELLATIONS
Holidaymakers at major airports around the globe are fuming as they face lengthy queues and flight cancellations today.
More than 100 planes had to be grounded in the UK because of the Microsoft outage, while over 3,300 flights were cancelled globally.
Popular budget airline Ryanair simply advised passengers to go home.
Global airports affected
Airports in Australia, Spain, Amsterdam, Germany, India, and the United States have also been hit by the huge IT problem.
American Airlines passengers were devastated this morning when all flights were cancelled.
Even smaller airlines have been hit, with Allegiant Air, Spirit Airlines, Frontier and SunCountry grounding planes.
Meanwhile, frustrated travellers at San Francisco Airport have been reporting suspended flights.
Similar chaotic scenes have been spotted inside Detroit Metro Airport, with flyers sharing footage of ever-growing queues on virtual communication networks.
Across the globe, Mumbai Airport revealed their check-in desks were shut down for IndiGo, Akasa and Spice Jet flights.
And major Australian airline Qantas later kept all planes on the tarmac.
Schipol Airport in Amsterdam told holidaymakers that flights to and from the Netherlands are affected.
Elsewhere in Europe, the Spanish airport association AENA reported issues at 42 airports, including Ibiza and Palma Mallorca Airports.
Rome’s Fiumicino Airport also reported longer queue times.
In Germany, Hamburg Airport and Berlin’s BER Airport were also rocked by the IT outage.
The Hague Airport in Rotterdam warned travellers they will be experiencing longer wait times.
Meanwhile, Narita International Airport in Narita, east of Tokyo urged travellers to be wary of check-in delays.
And Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok reported longer queues, as Hong Kong Express Airways passengers have been delayed at Hong Kong International Airport.
STORES AND SUPERMARKETS
As the global IT crash also affected the banks, in many stores and supermarkets Clients had to rely solely on the old and safe cash payments.
Thousands of people have also reportedly been locked out of their banks due to the outage.
Online services and transactions across banks in Australia have been affected with Beyond Bank Australia saying it was “experiencing intermittent issues”.
They warned customers may face trouble using their cards and accessing any online accounts.
The London Stock Exchange is also affected, claim worrying reports.
So-called Blue Screen of Death errors (BSOD) have appeared on laptop and computer screens across the world for Microsoft users.
The blue screen essentially forces laptops and computers to suddenly shut down and restart.
However, users say they are getting the screen several times back to back, shutting them out of their PC completely.
Self-service screens are also reportedly showing the BSOD in stores throughout Australia such as Woolworths and Coles.
WHAT ACTUALLY OCCURRED TODAY
Various Microsoft services in Europe, Asia, North America and Oceania have all been facing tech issues in the past few hours.
The chaos comes on what is set to be busiest day for flights in five years as the school holidays get underway for summer.
The tech issues have affected people’s ability to access Microsoft 365 apps and services.
Cybersecurity software firm CrowdStrike, who greatly rely on AI, say they have identified the issue behind the global outage as a flawed anti-viral update.
The firm are reportedly used by Microsoft to handle various updates to their systems.
Microsoft has since announced it is taking “mitigation actions” against the issues.
They said via X: “Our services are still seeing continuous improvements while we continue to take mitigation actions.
We remain committed in treating this event with the highest priority and urgency while we continue to address the lingering impact for the remaining Microsoft 365 apps that are in a degraded state.”
A Microsoft spokesperson told Bloomberg that a “resolution is forthcoming”.
CrowdStrike said in a post on their website: “CrowdStrike is aware of reports of crashes on Windows related to the Falcon Sensor.”
They confirmed it isn’t a hack or a cyber attack that caused the issues.
President & CEO George Kurtz said on X: “CrowdStrike is actively working with customers impacted by a defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts. The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed.”
Senad Arun, founder of cyber research company Imperum, described the chaos as “CrowdStrike Doom’s Day”.
Another leading cybersecurity expert called the incident “unforgivable”.
Alan Woodward, professor of cybersecurity at Surrey University, said: “The big question is: How did that get through testing? How did it get launched onto the world?
That’s just unforgivable that something as embedded as that, which can cause such problems……. it can’t have been thoroughly tested before it was launched or they would have seen it.”
TRAIL OF DESTRUCTION
by Jamie Harris, Assistant Technology and Science Editor at The Sun
This is probably one of the biggest outages that I have witnessed in my career as a technology journalist.
It’s been so far reaching, affecting multiple countries and multiple sectors, from aviation, healthcare, travel, rail travel, banks, big and small businesses alike.
So this is a really huge outage and it’s been going on for several hours.
We’ve seen major TV stations go off air and other broadcasters struggling, banking systems, GP, systems, airlines – you name it.
People across the world have been saying that they’ve been getting the dreaded “blue screen of death” which we’ve all seen before and is not ideal for people logging into work on a Friday morning.
Glitches take place all the time and are usually brief but with this one it has gone on for hours. Nobody really seems to know when it’s going to be completely fixed, and so there’s just a trail of destruction in its path.
The situation just shows how dependent we are on technology these days. Most aspects of our lives are dependent on IT systems, so if one goes down, then essentially, it’s a domino effect, and everyone has to suffer.
yogaesoteric
July 19, 2024