Massive global IT outage hits airlines, banks, markets

Services from airlines to healthcare, shipping and finance were coming back online yesterday after a global digital outage disrupted computer systems for hours, laying bare the vulnerability created by the world’s shift toward interconnected technologies following the Covid-19 pandemic.
After the outage was resolved, companies are now dealing with backlogs of delayed and cancelled flights and medical appointments, missed orders and other issues that could take days to resolve. They also face questions about how to avoid future blackouts triggered by technology meant to safeguard their systems.
An earlier software update by global cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, one of the largest operators in the industry, triggered systems problems that grounded flights, forced broadcasters off air and left customers without access to services such as healthcare or banking.
Since the Covid pandemic broke out in 2020, governments and businesses have become increasingly dependent on a handful of interconnected technology companies over the past two decades, which explains why one software issue rippled far and wide.
The outage shone a spotlight on CrowdStrike, an $83bn company that is not a household name but has more than 20,000 subscribers around the world including Amazon.com and Microsoft. CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz said on social media platform X that a defect was found “in a single content update for Windows hosts” that affected Microsoft customers.
“We’re deeply sorry for the impact that we’ve caused to customers, to travellers, to anyone affected by this, including our company,” Kurtz told NBC News. “Many of the customers are rebooting the system and it’s coming up and it’ll be operational.”
CrowdStrike has one of the largest shares of the highly competitive cybersecurity market, leading some industry analysts to question whether control over such operationally critical software should remain with just a handful of companies.
Air travel was immediately hit, as carriers depend on smooth scheduling that, when interrupted, can ripple into lengthy delays. Out of more than 110,000 scheduled commercial flights yesterday, 5,000 have been cancelled globally with more expected, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium.
Banks and financial services companies warned customers of disruptions and traders across markets spoke of problems executing transactions. (Reuters) Business Page 4, Pages 4, 6