Times Square goes dark & blue screens halt work for millions as Microsoft outage ‘exposes fragility of world’s internet’
CROWDSTRIKE’S worldwide outage has exposed the “fragility of the world’s core internet infrastructure,” a leading cyber security expert has warned.
The tech crash, triggered by a failed overnight update from the cybersecurity firm to Microsoft Windows, grounded over a thousand flights that were set to take off Friday morning.
In what has been branded the “largest IT outage in history”, major railway and supermarket services across the globe have also been pummelled by the tech glitch.
American Airlines, United, and Delta requested a global ground stop on all flights in the early hours of the morning, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
Over 2,600 flights have faced delays and over 1,200 flights have been canceled in the US as of 9 am ET, according to FlightAware.
Television channels, banks, GPs and supermarkets around the world are also on their knees following the chaos.
The sweeping disruption prompted one expert to issue an eery warning
“This is a very, very uncomfortable illustration of the fragility of the world’s core internet infrastructure,” said Ciaran Martin, a professor at Oxford University’s Blavatnik School of Government and former Head of Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre.
What we know so far:
- More than 500 flight delays have been reported across the U.S.
- American Airlines, Delta, and United are among major companies that have been affected
- 911 services and hospitals have also been hit by the issue
- CrowdStrike said the outage was not a cyberattack
- Microsoft has confirmed the underlying issue has been fixed but some services could still be affected
- Major shipping terminals have delayed opening
- New York City and Washington D.C. transport systems were impacted
- Blue “recovery” displays have appeared on screens across the country, from airport terminals to major store billboards
CrowdStrike has issued a fix for the update as CEO George Kurtz confirmed the incident “is not a security incident or cyberattack.”
Despite reassurance from Microsoft and CrowdStrike, security pro Al Lakhani told The U.S. Sun that the problems could continue for weeks.
“The fallout from incidents like these can be extensive and prolonged,” said Lakhani, the CEO of security firm IDEE.
“In terms of restoring every affected computer to full operation, the recovery could span hours, days, or even weeks.”
Cybersecurity expert Troy Hunt added that the cyber outage could be the “largest IT outage in history.”
“I don’t think it’s too early to call it: this will be the largest IT outage in history,” Hunt said in a post on X on Friday.
“This is basically what we were all worried about with Y2K, except it’s actually happened this time.”
The tech meltdown is affecting more than flights as millions of computers are left blank with the “screen of death” – including iconic billboards in Times Square in New York City.
The impacted screens were subsequently turned off, switching from blue to black.
New York City’s MTA customer information system has also been affected as MTA said systems are “temporarily offline due to a worldwide technical outage.”
The outage has affected 911 call centers as emergency services are down across Alaska, Arizona, Indiana, Minnesota, New Hampshire, and Ohio because workers can’t access their computers.
Downdetector is also reporting a growing number of outages with banks and payment services including Visa, Bank of America, Charles Schwab, TD Bank, and Chase while the outage persists.
Outage could take 'weeks' to resolve
Tech experts have told The U.S. Sun that even though an official fix has been released for the Microsoft outage, problems related to the blackout will continue to last.
Al Lakhani, CEO of security firm IDEE, said that the issues could persist for weeks.
“The fallout from incidents like these can be extensive and prolonged,” Lakhani said.
“In terms of restoring every affected computer to full operation, the recovery could span hours, days, or even weeks.
“This is because it is a supply chain attack. These are particularly damaging because a single compromised software update can impact thousands of organizations globally.
“Leading to severe consequences including service disruptions, theft of intellectual property, and threats to national security.”
Another security expert Adam Pilton told The U.S. Sun that it will take days for bigger businesses to recover.
“Depending upon the size of the organization will determine the recovery time,” said Adam, senior cybersecurity expert at Cybersmart, speaking to The U.S. Sun.
“CrowdStrike has released a fix and provided guidance which is working for many users.
“For smaller organizations, this will take hours, for larger organizations this may take days to resolve.”
Martin Jartelius, chief security officer at Outpost24, told The U.S. Sun that some affected computers might have to be manually repaired.
“For those impacted, if their systems did not get the erroneous update then that is a positive,” Jartelius said.
“If they did get the update, some seem to be able to get up and running and they will fix themselves.
“Others will currently have a workaround to get the good update and have some hands-on support, including boot into safe mode and removing some files, expect this to be done swiftly for any systems that need a high availability.
“But expect the cleanup in IT-departments to potentially drag out over the summer vacation period.
“So, where it really matters, this should not be too hard to fix, but it will cost time and effort.”
Some businesses are asking customers to use cash as debit and credit cards won’t work while systems are offline due to the outage.
A convenience store in Greenville, South Carolina, has a sign on the door saying “Cash only. Debit and credit is down company wide,” according to local NBC affiliate WYFF.
Hospitals are also affected in the chaos as ABC News reported Mass General Brigham in Boston canceled all elective surgeries due to the outage.
EXPERT WARNING
Cybersecurity experts have warned people and companies that “we must learn” to avoid another incident like this, The U.S. Sun has previously reported.
Although CrowdStrike’s CEO conformed this incident was not a tech threat, specialists have warned hackers could potentially shut down systems across the global in a replicated attack.
Martin Jartelius, Chief Security Officer at Outpost24, exclusively spoke to The U.S. Sun.
“This is similar to a supply chain attack,” Jartelius said.
What is CrowdStrike?
THE global cyber outage affecting TV channels, banks, hospitals, airports and emergency services appears to relate to an issue at cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.
IT security firm CrowdStrike ran a recorded phone message on Friday – saying it was aware of reports of crashes on Microsoft’s Windows operating system relating to its Falcon sensor.
A prerecorded message said: “Thanks for contacting CrowdStrike support. CrowdStrike is aware of reports of crashes on Windows… related to the Falcon sensor.”
CrowdStrike, headquartered in Austin, Texas, says it is a global security leader which provides an advanced platform to protect data.
A CrowdStrike update on Friday is said to have caused a critical error in Microsoft operating systems, affecting millions worldwide.
The company regularly updates systems with new anti-virus software.
Cyber expert Troy Hunt told Australian TV network Seven: “It looks like they’ve pushed a bad update, which is presently nuking every machine that takes it.”
“If an attacker had backdoored such an update to open systems to attacks or to encrypt them, the exact same systems would have been impacted.
“This is why supply chain attacks and defense has been increasingly important.”
PASSENGER PANDEMONIUM
This was not been the only major travel disruption top hit flyers this week.
Frontier, Allegiant Air, and SunCountry, all suffered from a significant Microsoft outage.
These airlines had grounded all of their flights for several hours on Wednesday, as the stop was lifted later that night.
“Our systems are currently impacted by a Microsoft outage, which is also affecting other companies,” Frontier said in a statement on its website.
“We appreciate your patience.”
This comes a year after the FAA forced all domestic flights to stay on the tarmac, which caused more than 4,000 delays, The U.S. previously reported.
This system failure had caused the biggest travel disruption in the U.S. since 9/11.
