The largest IT disruption in history, resulting from a software update on a device that impacted Microsoft systems on July 19, 2024, impacted around 8.5 million Windows devices worldwide in various sectors. 

𝗔𝗶𝗿𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗱 

CrowdStrike’s outage last Friday, July 19, 2024, had a significant impact on the aviation industry. Major U.S. airlines, including American Airlines, United, Delta and Frontier, being among the US carriers heavily impacted on Friday morning, issued a “global ground stop” due to the communication issue, according to Federal Aviation Authority.  

𝗛𝗲𝗮𝗹𝘁𝗵𝗰𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗦𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗶𝗰𝗲𝘀 𝗗𝗶𝘀𝗿𝘂𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗱 

Major hospitals in the U.S. were not spared from the chaos. John Riggi, AHA National Advisor for Cybersecurity and Risk said, “The AHA is in close communication with the hospital field and the federal government about the non-malicious global technology outage that occurred early this morning.” He further added, “These disruptions are resulting in some clinical procedure delays, diversions or cancellations.” 

𝗕𝗮𝗻𝗸𝘀 𝗪𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗢𝗳𝗳𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲 

The banking sector also felt the sting of the outage. Banks reported IT disruptions, which affected their operations. The exact extent of the impact on the banking sector is still being assessed. Arvest Bank, Bank of America, Capital One, Charles Schwab Corporation, Chase, TD Bank, US Bank, and Wells Fargo were among the affected banks as of this time. 

𝗠𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗮 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗧𝗩 𝗕𝗿𝗼𝗮𝗱𝗰𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗔𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗲𝗱 

Media companies and TV broadcasters were among the other businesses that reported disruptions. The “blue screen of death” became a common sight on public screens across the U.S., symbolizing the widespread impact of the outage. Some of the broadcasters that were impacted include NBC News, MSNBC, and Sky News. 

𝗚𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗦𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗶𝗰𝗲𝘀 

The CrowdStrike outage had a significant impact on government services. Among those impacted and reported were the Social Security Administration offices who had to close for the day due to the incident. Additionally, the Federal Communications Commission reported that some 911 services were disrupted, including state and local governments. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) is working with CrowdStrike, Microsoft, and their federal, state, local, and critical infrastructure partners to fully assess and address system outages. 

The global outage caused significant disruptions to various sectors including airlines, airports, banks, hotels, hospitals, manufacturing, stock markets, broadcasting, gas stations, retail stores, and more. The estimated financial impact worldwide is believed to exceed US$10 billion. Although a solution was promptly provided, the recovery efforts are still in progress as affected systems require manual intervention, along with addressing the resulting issues. 

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