A major internet outage affecting Microsoft is disrupting flights, banks, media outlets and companies across the world, with problems continuing hours after the technology company said it was gradually fixing an issue affecting access to Microsoft 365 apps and services.
Airlines and airports in the United States, Europe, Australia, India and elsewhere were reporting problems, with some flights grounded. Retail outlets, banks, railway companies and hospitals in several parts of the world were also affected in what appeared to be an unprecedented internet disruption.
Here’s the latest:
Ticket sales for Universal Studios Japan affected by global system outage
TOKYO — Universal Studios Japan in Osaka, western Japan, said the global system outage that started Friday will continue to affect ticket sales at the park over the weekend.
The park said its ticket booths sales will not be available Saturday and Sunday and asked visitors to purchase their tickets on the USJ official website or via designated ticket sales site Lawson Ticket. Park attractions aren’t affected.
Emergency call centers in some US states report outages
Officials in some U.S. states, including Alaska, Virginia and Iowa, warned of problems to 911 emergency call centers in their areas. Alaska State Troopers warned that many 911 and nonemergency call centers across the state weren’t working correctly and shared alternate numbers.
In Virginia, the City of Fairfax Police Department said on social media that it was experiencing technical difficulties with its phone systems, including 911. The department shared a nonemergency number for callers and said 911 could still be used, but calls wouldn’t go directly to the dispatch center.
The New Hampshire Emergency Services and Communications reported a temporary interruption to 911 calls early Friday, with the system fully restored several hours later, officials said. In Iowa, the Marion County Sheriff’s Office warned on social media that phone lines were down and 911 calls might be routed to neighboring counties, but emergency calls would be promptly redirected to the sheriff’s office.
In New England, the outage led some hospitals to cancel appointments.
A spokesman at Mass General Brigham, the largest health care system in Massachusetts, said the outage had resulted in all scheduled nonurgent surgeries, procedures and medical visits being canceled for Friday. Emergency departments remain open and care for patients in the hospital hasn’t been impacted.
IT outage affects hospitals, border crossing, flights in Canada
TORONTO — The outage grounded some flights, disrupted hospitals and backed up border crossings in Canada on Friday.
Porter Airlines said it was canceling its flights for several hours because of the outage. Meanwhile, Air Canada, Canada’s largest airline, said there is no major impact to its operations, adding that it’s monitoring the situation closely. University Health Network, one of Canada’s largest hospital networks, said that some of its systems had been impacted by the outage. In a post to social media, it said clinical activity was continuing as scheduled, but some patients may experience delays. Windsor Police reported long delays at both the Canada-United States border crossings at the Ambassador Bridge and the Detroit-Windsor tunnel.
IT companies in Sri Lanka affected by global outage
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — The National Center for Cyber Security in Sri Lanka says four information technology companies in Sri Lanka have been affected because of the global outage.
Sri Lanka Computer Emergency Readiness Team, which is known as Sri Lanka CERT, says that so far only four companies have informed them of being affected and the center attributed them to a problem with the cybersecurity platform CrowdStrike.
Charuka Damunupola, lead information security engineer at Sri Lanka CERT, says those companies were using CrowdStrike software and their systems “are in failure mode.”
Landings at Zurich Airport are back to normal, takeoffs to US resume
BERLIN — Landings at Switzerland’s Zurich Airport were back to normal on Friday afternoon after being suspended earlier in the day, and the airport operator said takeoffs to the U.S. also resumed.
At least 100 flights to and from Zurich were canceled Friday.
German regional grocery chain temporarily shut hundreds of stores
BERLIN — A German regional grocery chain, Tegut, temporarily shut its 340 stores in the country Friday morning as the computer outage affected cash register systems.
By early afternoon, more than half of the stores were open again.
Banks in South Africa experience service disruptions for several hours
CAPE TOWN, South Africa — In South Africa, at least two major banks said they experienced service disruptions as customers complained they weren’t able to make payments using their bank cards at grocery stores and gas stations or use ATMs. Both said they were able to restore services hours later.
Southern African regional airline Airlink also reported that its IT network and telephone lines were down because of what it called a global network outage, but said flights weren’t affected.
London Stock Exchange experiencing disruptions, but trading not affected
LONDON — The London Stock Exchange says it is experiencing disruptions from the technology outage that has created chaos around the globe.
The LSE says its regulatory news service was not working Friday morning, but the outage hadn’t affected trading.
“We are currently experiencing a third party technical issue which is impacting some of our services,” a London Stock Exchange Group spokesperson said in a statement.
The exchange says it’s trying to resolve the problem as soon as possible.
Long lines at many airports around the world, but some systems back online
Long queues have formed at many airports around the world as the global internet outage hit check-in procedures for flights — although in some locations systems were now back online.
Berlin’s Brandenburg Airport was gradually returning to normal operations, the airport said in a statement, though some airlines had been forced to cancel flights after being hit with the outage from 7 a.m. local time (0500 GMT).
“Passenger handling continued with some restrictions. Departures took place with restrictions. There are still waiting times. Unfortunately, some flights had to be canceled by the airlines. The airport’s systems have been restarted and we are gradually returning to normal operations,” the airport said.
German-based airline Eurowings, a budget subsidiary of Lufthansa, says it had to cancel German domestic flights as well as services to and from the U.K. because of disruption to its check-in and boarding processes. It called on people traveling inside Germany to book train tickets and submit them for reimbursement.
In South Korea, several low-cost airlines reported problems, triggering delays in passenger boardings at Incheon international Airport, the country’s biggest airport, airport officials said.
Jeju Air Co. said it was experiencing problems with ticketing and other services on its website. Air Premia Inc. said key services on its website, such as ticket bookings, cancellations and online check-ins, weren’t working. The website of Eastar Jet Co. wasn’t accessible as of early Friday evening. Incheon airport officials and the country’s Transport Ministry said they were checking details of damages.
AirAsia announced on its Thai Facebook page that its reservation and check-in system had been impacted and encouraged passengers to go to airports early as they might face slower check-in and longer lines.
In the U.S., United Airlines said that the outage was impacting its computer systems and warned customers of potential flight delays. The carrier said some flights are resuming and it is issuing waivers to make it easier to change travel plans within its website.
Cybersecurity company at heart of IT outage says the issue isn’t a cyberattack or security incident
LONDON — The chief executive of the cybersecurity company at the heart of a worldwide Microsoft outage says it is working to fix a defect sent out in a Windows update.
“This is not a security incident or cyberattack,” CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz posted on X. “The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed.”
Kurtz said there was a defect in a “single content update for Windows hosts.” Mac and Linux hosts weren’t affected.
The company referred customers to its support portal for updates.
Pharmacy chains in Norway report problems with providing prescription medication
HELSINKI — Two pharmacy chains in Norway said they are having problems providing customers with their prescription medicine and are facing substantial connection delays because of the global network problems.
Several branches of the Apotek1 pharmacy have closed across Norway after being affected by IT issues, which also shut down the chain’s online sales, the Norwegian news agency NTB reported.
The Boots drugstore and pharmacy chain also ran into problems delivering products to clients in Norway. Boots said that “due to global network problems, you may experience challenges with ordering and possible delays in dispatches,” NTB reported.
Paris Olympics organizers say some Olympic delegations’ arrivals have been delayed
PARIS — Paris Olympics organizers say some Olympic delegations’ arrivals, as well as the delivery of some uniforms and accreditations, have been delayed because of the outage.
The organizers said in a statement that ticketing and the torch relay haven’t been affected.
“Our teams have been fully mobilized to ensure the continuity of operations at optimum levels,” organizers said.
Internet outage causes problems at most doctors’ offices across England
LONDON — Britain’s National Health Service says a global internet outage is causing problems at most doctors’ offices across England.
NHS England said in a statement that the glitch was hitting the appointment and patient record system used across the health service. The state-funded NHS treats the vast majority of people in the U.K.
The NHS said the issue was affecting the majority of family doctors’ practices, but wasn’t hitting the 999 number used to call for emergency ambulances.
Airlines across the world report disruptions to flights
Airlines across the world, from Thailand to Australia, India, the United States and several European countries, reported disruptions to check-in systems and other issues that caused flights to be grounded or delayed.
With athletes and spectators from around the world heading to France for the Paris Olympics, the Paris airport authority says its computer systems ″are not impacted″ by the global outage, but several airlines and airports elsewhere are.
As a result, ″this situation has an impact on the operations of airlines at Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly airports: delays in check-in, delays and temporary suspension of some flights. Our teams are mobilized to orient and assist passengers,″ the airport authority said in a statement.
In the U.S., the FAA said the airlines United, American, Delta and Allegiant had all been grounded.
Thailand’s Suvarnabhumi Airport, a gateway to one of the world’s most visited cities, reported that some airlines were forced to check in passengers manually because of outages to their systems, while in the country’s second largest airport of Don Mueang, Air Asia was also checking passengers in manually.
Director of Tourism of Thailand, the country’s tourism authority, told state broadcaster Thai PBS the issue was with Navitaire, an e-commerce platform for air travel, and up to six airports had been affected.
In Germany, flights at Berlin-Brandenburg Airport were halted for several hours from Friday morning because of check-in problems, while some flights were canceled. An airport spokeswoman said flights resumed after 10 a.m. Issues were also reported in the busy European hubs of Amsterdam, Zurich and Rome.
Baltic container hub in Poland suspends business
WARSAW — Baltic Hub, a major container hub in the Baltic port of Gdansk, Poland, says it’s battling problems resulting from the global system outage.
Their entry gates are temporarily closed and they have suspended business, the Baltic Hub said in a statement.
Passengers crowd the International flights departure terminal of Rome’s Fiumicino airport, Friday, July 19, 2024, as many flights have been delayed or cancelled due to the worldwide internet outage. Microsoft says users worldwide may be unable to access various Microsoft 365 apps and services in a widespread outage. The cause, exact nature and scale of the outage was unclear. Microsoft appeared to suggest in its X posts that the situation was improving, but hours later, widespread outages were being reported by airlines around the world. Credit: AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia 
Passengers crowd the International flights departure terminal of Rome’s Fiumicino airport, Friday, July 19, 2024, as many flights have been delayed or cancelled due to the worldwide internet outage. Microsoft says users worldwide may be unable to access various Microsoft 365 apps and services in a widespread outage. The cause, exact nature and scale of the outage was unclear. Microsoft appeared to suggest in its X posts that the situation was improving, but hours later, widespread outages were being reported by airlines around the world. Credit: AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia
British broadcaster back on air
LONDON — Britain’s Sky News was broadcasting again after the outage knocked it off the air during the morning. The news anchor referred to printed notes as Sky News got back on the air. The broadcaster was able to deliver news online, on its app and website during the broadcast outage.
Milan’s stock exchange index information restored
ROME — Borsa Italiana, the company that manages Milan’s stock exchange, said the “correct disclosure of the index FTSE MIB has been restored.” Earlier Friday, the company had said that the index hadn’t been updated, without providing additional information.
Israel’s Cyber Directorate attributes outage to cybersecurity platform Crowdstrike
JERUSALEM — Israel’s Cyber Directorate said on Friday that it was among those affected by the global outages, attributing them to a problem with the cybersecurity platform Crowdstrike. The outage also hit the country’s post offices and hospitals, according to the ministries of communication and health.
A recording playing on CrowdStrike’s customer service line said, “CrowdStrike is aware of the reports of crashes on Microsoft ports related to the Falcon sensor.” It attributed the problems to one of its products used to block online attacks. It said callers should monitor its customer support portal.
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Internet outage latest: Airlines, businesses hit by global technology disruption (2024, July 19)
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