Global Outage: 100 Million Windows Users Hit with ‘Blue Screen’

A massive outage has brought global networks to a standstill, leaving television channels, airports, and banks scrambling to recover from the sudden shutdown. The crisis began early on Friday morning, July 19, with Sky News’s breakfast show being replaced by archive footage and Downdetector, a website that tracks outages, reporting a surge in issues with Microsoft applications, banking websites, and airline apps.

The travel industry was severely impacted, with Ryanair urging passengers to arrive at airports three hours early due to a “third-party IT issue” that affected all airlines operating across the network.

The airline’s website was among those experiencing difficulties, with passengers facing difficulties in checking in and accessing flight information.

The outage was not limited to Europe, with reports of problems emerging from Australia, New Zealand, India, and Japan. The UK was expected to be particularly affected during Friday’s rush hour.

Cybersecurity experts were quick to point to Crowdstrike, a piece of antivirus software, as the culprit behind the global chaos.

Troy Hunt, a renowned cybersecurity researcher, described the situation as “something super weird” and reported that individuals worldwide were experiencing the infamous “blue screen of death” on their Windows computers.

Senad Arun, founder of cyber research company Imperum, dubbed the incident “Crowdstrike Doom’s Day.”

Crowdstrike itself acknowledged the issue on its website, stating: “Crowdstrike is aware of reports of crashes on Windows related to the Falcon Sensor.”

As the world struggles to recover from this unprecedented outage, it remains unclear what exactly caused the problem or how widespread it will be.

However, one thing is certain: this sudden and widespread disruption has sent shockwaves around the globe, highlighting the interconnectedness of modern technology and the importance of robust cybersecurity measures.

Source: Telegraph UK