No evidence of cyber security incident, says Australia\u2019s National Cyber Security Coordinator Michelle McGuinness on X
\n Washington
\nMassive technology outage has disrupted businesses and institutions in multiple countries, throwing airports, airlines, rail companies, government services, banks, stock exchanges, supermarkets, telecoms, health systems and media outlets into chaos.
\nThe disruption was caused by an update to a product offered by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, which had caused machines running the Microsoft Windows operating system said, \u201cCrowdStrike seems to have had some sort of mandatory update to its software that went horribly wrong.\u201d
\nThe company had reported that the issue was related to its Falcon sensor product, engineers identifying a \u201ccontent deployment problem\u201d, said Hull.
\n\u201cEssentially it happens as you\u2019re sitting in front of your terminal. If your terminal is a Microsoft Windows terminal, it suddenly goes to a blank blue screen. It\u2019s called the \u2018blue screen of death\u2019 error. You are locked out of your operating system,\u201d Hull said.
\nCrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz said on Friday that the company was \u201cactively working\u201d with customers who had been impacted by \u201ca defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts\u201d.
\n\u201cThis is not a security incident or cyber attack,\u201d he said, posting on X.
\nAt the time of reporting, some of the malfunctioning business, companies and computer app systems were beginning to return to normal service, including Sky News in the United Kingdom, which was down for an hour in the morning.
\nThe outages rippled far and wide, with transport systems around the world among the hardest hit.
\nIn the United States, major airlines Delta, United and American Airlines were grounded on Friday morning due to a communication issue, according to an update by the Federal Aviation Administration.
\nIn Australia, flight information screens at Sydney airport went blank. The airport said that flights were arriving and departing but that travellers should expect delays.
\nMelbourne airport said that check-in procedures for some airlines had been affected.
\nAirports in the United Kingdom, Germany, India, Malaysia and the Philippines also reported disruptions to services.
\nAmsterdam\u2019s Schiphol airport, one of Europe\u2019s busiest hubs, was also hit, with a spokesperson saying: \u201cThe outage has an impact on flights flying from and to Schiphol,\u201d adding that it was not yet clear how many flights were affected.
\nAll airports in Spain were experiencing \u201cdisruptions\u201d, the airport operator Aena said.
\nAir France said its operations were also affected, but that flights already en route were not affected.
\nHong Kong Airport Authority said airlines affected by the outage have switched to manual check-in and flight operations have not been affected.
\nKenya Airways\u2019s booking system was impacted, the airline said, warning customers to expect slower service than usual.
\nMultiple other sectors were also affected.
\nBanks and other financial institutions from Australia to India and South Africa warned clients about disruptions to their services.
\nAustralia\u2019s largest bank, Commonwealth Bank (CBA.AX), said some customers had been unable to transfer money due to the service outage.
\nIn the UK, the London Stock Exchange (LSE) was hit by a technical glitch that affected its news service and delayed its display of opening trades.
\nMedia companies also saw their broadcasts severely disrupted.
\nAustralia\u2019s national broadcaster, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and Network Ten confirmed that their systems had been affected.
\nSky News, one of the UK\u2019s major news broadcasters went off air, apologising for being unable to transmit live.
\nIn the UK, booking systems used by doctors were offline, multiple reports from medical officials on X said.
\nThe Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the United Arab Emirates said some of its systems were impacted, including its \u201cattestation service\u201d, in a post on X. \u201cWe advise users to refrain from conducting any transactions until this issue is resolved,\u201d it said.
\nIn Australia, Victoria\u2019s state police said some internal systems had been hit by the outage but emergency services were operating normally.
\nNew Zealand\u2019s parliamentary computer systems were affected, according to Rafael Gonzalez-Montero, head of the parliamentary service.
\nAustralia\u2019s National Cyber Security Coordinator said on Friday that it was aware of a \u201clarge-scale technical outage\u201d affecting numerous business and services across the country.
\n\u201cOur current information is this outage relates to a technical issue with a third-party software platform employed by affected companies,\u201d the agency said in a statement.
\n\u201cThere is no information to suggest it is a cyber security incident. We continue to engage across key stakeholders.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
No evidence of cyber security incident, says Australia\u2019s National Cyber Security Coordinator Michelle McGuinness on X Washington Massive technology outage has disrupted businesses and institutions in multiple countries, throwing airports, airlines, rail companies, government services, banks, stock exchanges, supermarkets, telecoms, health systems and media outlets into chaos. The disruption was caused by an update to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":419357,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-419353","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n