San Francisco, July 21, 2024, The Europe Today: A global tech outage, attributed to a software update by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, affected nearly 8.5 million Microsoft devices, according to a blog post by Microsoft on Saturday. The tech giant stated, “We currently estimate that CrowdStrike’s update affected 8.5 million Windows devices, or less than one percent of all Windows machines.”
The software update by CrowdStrike, one of the largest operators in the cybersecurity industry, caused widespread system problems. The outage impacted various sectors, grounding flights, disrupting broadcasters, and leaving customers without access to essential services such as healthcare and banking.
“While the percentage was small, the broad economic and societal impacts reflect the use of CrowdStrike by enterprises that run many critical services,” Microsoft said in its blog post.
Microsoft indicated that CrowdStrike has developed a solution to help accelerate a fix within Microsoft’s Azure infrastructure. Additionally, Microsoft is collaborating with Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud Platform, sharing information about the effects being observed across the industry.
The air travel industry, particularly hard hit by the outage, was in recovery mode on Saturday. Thousands of flights were canceled, leaving passengers stranded or facing extensive delays as airports and airlines grappled with the IT disruption.
Delta Air Lines was among the hardest-hit carriers, with more than 600 flights canceled as of 10 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT) on Saturday. The airline warned that additional cancellations were expected.
The incident highlights the interconnected nature of modern digital infrastructure and the significant impact that disruptions can have on critical services and everyday life.
