A massive IT outage, triggered by a routine software update, has crippled companies worldwide. Affected sectors include airlines, financial service providers, and media groups.

Flight Cancellations and Workplace Disruptions

On Friday, thousands of flights were canceled, employees in cities from Tokyo to London could not log into their computers, hospital surgeries were postponed, and some TV stations went off the air.

The outage is attributed to a security update from the US company CrowdStrike that caused an issue with Microsoft's Windows. PCs and servers are affected, indicating that millions of computers may need to be repaired to resolve the problem.

Over 12 hours after the problems began, some services, including airlines and media groups, were back online. However, due to the unprecedented scale of the issue, it could take days before all Windows users can return to normal operations.

Reactions and Impacts

This will be the biggest IT outage in history," said Troy Hunt, a prominent security consultant, in a social media post. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, wrote on social media: "Biggest IT blunder of all time," followed by "Microsoft" next to an angry emoji face.

In an online consultation, CrowdStrike informed its customers that they need to restart each affected computer, delete the faulty update file, and then restart again. Allie Mellen, an analyst at IT research group Forrester, said, "Fixing this issue requires manual, hands-on work on hundreds of thousands of affected machines.

In China, some workers were pleased about an early weekend after their employers sent them home. "Thank you, Microsoft, for the early vacation" was trending on the microblogging site Weibo, where users posted pictures of blue error screens.

Australian companies were the first to issue warnings as the operations of retailers like Woolworths and 7-Eleven were affected. Sydney Airport reported a "global technical outage" that impacted its operations.

Affected Sectors

Financial Services: Banks, brokers, and financial technology companies worldwide, such as JPMorgan Chase, UBS, and Bloomberg, were affected, preventing some traders from accessing their systems and processing transactions. JPMorgan's trading systems were impacted, as well as UBS and the fintech company ION Group. Some Bloomberg Terminal users also experienced issues before the UK market opened on Friday.

Transport: Air passengers had to brace for extended disruptions as airlines started painstakingly restoring their schedules after the outage. By Friday afternoon London time, nearly 3,500 global flights had been canceled, approximately 3% of all scheduled flights, according to data provider Cirium. Airports from the USA to the United Kingdom to India and Australia reported issues.

Media, Consumers, and Sports: Sky News had to suspend programming on Friday morning but has since resumed broadcasting. Manchester United was one of many football clubs in England and Scotland that had to postpone the release of tickets to their games. The organizers of the Olympic Games in Paris also reported IT issues, just one week before the city expects millions of visitors.

Healthcare: Most general practices in the United Kingdom were affected by a problem with EMIS, an appointment and patient data system, which forced practices to use non-digital methods to communicate with patients. In Germany, the University Medical Center Schleswig-Holstein had to cancel all scheduled operations and close its outpatient clinics.

The largest hospital network in the US state of Massachusetts, Mass General Brigham, canceled all non-urgent surgical procedures and medical appointments.

Reactions of the affected companies

CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz said the company is working with affected customers to resolve the issue. "This is not a security incident or cyberattack," Kurtz said. "The problem has been identified, isolated, and a fix has been provided.

Microsoft stated: "A CrowdStrike update brought down a number of IT systems worldwide this morning. We are actively assisting our customers with the recovery.

Stock Market Reactions

The stocks of CrowdStrike fell by 9% in early afternoon trading in New York, while those of Microsoft dropped by 0.5%.