A major computer system outage affected a wide range of businesses around the world beginning late last week. But the cause of the outage was quickly identified and fixes were deployed to bring most businesses back online.
The problems were linked to a software update provided by cybersecurity company CrowdStrike. The outage affected computers using Microsoft’s Windows operating system. The incident caused major flight delays and cancellations. It also affected banking, health care, media and other businesses.
Computers affected by the outage showed what is known in the technology industry as the “blue screen of death.” This warning tool is designed to inform Windows users that there is a problem and to block further activity to prevent wider system damage.
Officials at Texas-based CrowdStrike were quick to admit a software update containing a programming mistake was sent to customers and caused the outage. Once the problem was identified and a fix deployed, CrowdStrike said it centered on assisting customers to get systems back up as soon as possible.
Technology experts noted one issue with the latest outage was that the problematic software update could not be corrected remotely. Instead, individual machines had to be fixed, with bad files removed by technology workers.
CrowdStrike’s main business is to provide solutions to help companies prevent internet attacks. However, company leaders made clear that the latest outage was only related to the software update and not part of any cybersecurity attack.
CrowdStrike continued to inform the public about its latest correction efforts and provided guidance for some businesses to attempt to deal with the issue themselves.
Disruptions around the world
The outage disrupted operations at airlines, banks, hospitals and organizations around the world.
Among U.S. airlines, Delta officials said Monday it was forced to cancel more than 4,000 flights since the outage began last Friday. But other major carriers, including American Airlines and United, reported they had largely ended any flight disruptions.
Delta chief Ed Bastian apologized to the airline’s customers for the continuing delays and cancellations. He said the company was working around the clock to fix all affected systems. Delta said about 60 percent of its main systems run on Microsoft Windows and therefore were left inoperable by the outage.
Some technology experts expressed concern that such outages can be extremely disruptive because the systems built to run most of the world’s computers are provided by only a small number of companies.
Gregory Falco is an assistant professor of engineering at Cornell University in New York. He studies internet security issues. Falco told The Associated Press it is a problem that so many computers worldwide depend on the same technologies and providers. “We rely on very few companies, and everybody uses the same folks, so everyone goes down at the same time,” Falco said.
CrowdStrike is one of the largest cybersecurity service providers, especially in transportation, health care, banking and media. This is the reason it affected so many businesses in those industries. An irony of the outage was that companies normally look to CrowdStrike’s tools to help prevent internet attacks that could bring their systems down and cause costly disruptions.
Falco noted that while fears of such a widespread outage have long existed, he thinks too few providers are becoming “even more entrenched” with certain technologies. "We like to think that we have a lot of players available. But at the end of the day, the biggest companies use all the same stuff.”
Richard Stiennon is a cybersecurity expert who has followed industry developments for 24 years. He told the AP he sees the software issue as a historic mistake by CrowdStrike. “This is easily the worst faux pas, technical faux pas or glitch of any security software provider ever,” Stiennon said.
He added that while the problem had an easy technical fix, it could still have lasting effects for some companies. This is because the outage required hands-on efforts to fix each affected computer and this can severely disrupt business operations.
I’m Bryan Lynn.
