Global computer outage is one of the biggest in history

A flawed software security update knocked out computer operations throughout the world, affecting airlines, hospitals, 911 systems, broadcasters, and other businesses. It was one of the biggest computer outages in history, with tens of millions of people affected. CrowdStrike, the company behind the problem, apologized, and said systems were gradually coming back online. NBC News' Tom Costello reports.
» Subscribe to NBC News: nbcnews.to/Subs...
» Watch more NBC video: bit.ly/MoreNBCNews
NBC News Digital is a collection of innovative and powerful news brands that deliver compelling, diverse and engaging news stories. NBC News Digital features NBCNews.com, MSNBC.com, TODAY.com, Nightly News, Meet the Press, Dateline, and the existing apps and digital extensions of these respective properties. We deliver the best in breaking news, live video coverage, original journalism and segments from your favorite NBC News Shows.
Connect with NBC News Online!
NBC News App: apps.nbcnews.c...
Breaking News Alerts: link.nbcnews.c...
Visit NBCNews.Com: nbcnews.to/ReadNBC
Find NBC News on Facebook: nbcnews.to/LikeNBC
Follow NBC News on Twitter: nbcnews.to/Foll...
Follow NBC News on Instagram: nbcnews.to/Inst...
#Microsoft #Crowdstrike #Outage

[@NubRusty]

I think this is what people were afraid of when Y2K was about to happen. Didn't think I would actually experience a global computer crisis of this scale in my lifetime.

[@dittocto]

You may also know about Year 2038 problem.

[@Rocket_Man.]

​@@dittoctoYou mean skynet?

[@dittocto]

@@Rocket_Man. It's related to time shows in computer, the computers will not show time on 19 January 2038. You can check its wikipedia page.

[@Xane_Dragon]

​@@timothycarpenter9947 My relative went out and bought tons of food and a wall of booty paper due to that and I told her that wasn't necessary. It looked like a mini grocery store 🤣

[@grodriguez5099]

That's wild I was just thinking that 😅

[@ivanmytube]

No Software Update Policy? Bad SLA? Test, small scale deployment, sit-and-wait, get approval, no uncontrollable automatic deployment… Risk Management Committee, CIO, CFO, all incompetent.

[@XSquidbeatsX]

Well is it a meritocracy?

[@allangibson8494]

They did the testing - and then rolled out a completely blank file.

[@josecolon8143]

ALL! Well said! 🫡

[@tavitafalima388]

3:17 😅😊😅😊😅

[@MukeshKumar-ij5cn]

How can a company allow this kind of update, it is cyber attack or some kind of testing.

[@damham5689]

Why isnt anyone asking the 2nd most important question over this Crowdstrike debacle. Who is responsible for the billions if not trillions of dollars in losses Crowdstrike caused worldwide ?

[@jorgealvarez247]

@@damham5689 this I like to know he ruined my day at work and lead to severe losses in my company

[@JesusRodriguez-kd8es]

Because then that would make sense 🤷‍♂️

[@ChesterTheSpider]

​@JesusRodriguez-kd8es not really because the company would go bankrupt before paying out even a percent of the issue. You can't live life destroying everything that has hiccups. Do you sell all your stocks because one of your holdings fell? No. This company did something dumb, they will learn from it or they will fail on their own. But they do provide a service that allows numerous institutions to function regularly.

[@dawickedj]

I do not believe it's hyperbole to say it's THE biggest outage of all time.

[@fransandreas9724]

Soon internet shoutdown, and affect all electicity system

[@fransandreas9724]

Believe or not it is not problem

[@TheMia1206]

EMP

[@liatris69]

This is what happens when you outsource your IT.

[@ProfessionalBirdWatcher]

People DIED because of CrowdStrike's gross negligence and CrowdStrike just says "🤷‍♂sorry fam," absolutely disgusting

[@switch1237]

Facts

[@MD-dl5hn]

Crowdstrike fixed it going forward. Every system still needed IT to go to the console and boot it into a recovery mode or safe mode. This is what I had to do all day to fix our systems. Crowdstrike should be ashamed for having such poor quality assurance and Microsoft should be ashamed that when this or a similar drive fails, it doesn't allow it to boot. They can code something in the future to still allow the system to boot.

[@morebaileyskim]

You are so right about that!

[@alfaeco15]

And no automatic roll back of an update if something goes wrong.

[@deekang6244]

And maybe companies not leave “automatic “ updates in place.

[@ytn00b3]

tell that to IT teams that support over 50,000 endpoints - you think that's easy?

[@allangibson8494]

You are assuming the systems are ABLE to go to safe mode. Safe / Recovery mode is turned off on a lot of corporate systems security policies.

[@C.P.C3719]

Didn’t test their code before pushing out the update into production. And they did this on a Friday, before the weeekend, definitely a no no in the IT world. Someone screened up, royally

[@cirella1064]

The fact that we have no redundancy systems in place is ridiculous.

[@STCatchMeTRACjRo]

costs, a redundancy system would need to be maintained, updated constantly even when not in use and that will cost..so cost.

[@pragueexpat5106]

Pushing a change to a production environment on Friday?.., very poor change management..

[@jokjones1]

Why do I feel like we're being lied to?

[@jobyjosegeorge1693]

Same question

[@jerry19484]

Because the world is too complex for most people to understand now, it’s human to react this way but harder to learn about how software works and realize civilization has been built on many many toothpicks

[@bradisbell]

Why *would* you feel like you're being lied to? The problem is clear. The fix went out quickly. Folks can independently audit this.

[@flightstatic4662]

paranoia

[@fabiolean]

I can verify the story. I work in IT and spent a very long day fixing stuff impacted by it. I saw the actual bad update file and its bad contents with my own eyes.

[@HopelessAutistic]

1993 called. It’s IBM laughing at Microsoft. They want their OS/2 back.

[@intelnew]

Those IT guys who were were in airport to witness this global event are unfortunately lucky 😂😂😂

[@sonicgalaxy27]

Yes they did.

[@wroughtforge7547]

Western media omitted that only Russia and China are not affected....because they use separate systems

[@abandonedbuildingexplorer]

Guessing they have built their own Linux-based operating systems? Of course, it would be a terrible idea for them in aggregate to rely on Microsoft or Apple. What do you know about the operating systems they utilize? As for the regular citizens, presumably a lot do opt for Microsoft and Apple, just not government agencies and corporations...

[@TravisDoesKayakFishing]

Why would western media care that Russia and China are not impacted?

[@timdow8951]

who cares

[@abandonedbuildingexplorer]

@@timdow8951 Some people do, clearly! Who cares? Some... Perhaps the minority or the majority, depending where you live and what type of dude you are.

[@michaelciccone2194]

AT&T just had another outage .... OUTSOURCING!!!

[@nenelawrence1]

I feel so bad about that elderly man that has his heart surgery postponed….

[@gb4939]

It's terrible. I mean airports, banks, driver licence offices is one thing, but hospitals and medical care is another...😢

[@garysgarage.2841]

What about all the babies that had to wait to be born or aborted.

[@nenelawrence1]

Yeah them too

[@dancingpixie6120]

We are way too reliant on technology, much to our detriment. SMH

[@jasonvaughan5128]

If anyone thinks this is due to a mistake via software update WASNT planned, then you can’t be helped.

[@RMX7777]

It's people that make conspiracies for literally anything on the news that need help.

[@akunavenerdi8943]

Interesting how all the Cashless Businesses are now begging for cash when their system is down.

[@lindapindabelinda3570]

I find it surprising that corporations don’t do the same thing that I do when updating computers. I only do one at a time manually and it is separated from my home network. If it doesn’t work on the first computer, I know where to stop.

[@kaptenhiu5623]

So how do they "automatically" fix it? It's impossible. The computer must be manually rebooted into safe mode, remove the responsible update files and then rebooted back up.

[@joyjit_roy]

*Hello Theo, let me give some perspective to the level of headache this is from a corporate IT team perspective. Our company has 10k servers across the globe - all down. Last night MS reached out and our limited IT team last night (it's Saturday in India) could only bring up 250 something servers ! A lot of them we couldn't even log into ! And it was saturday night !*

[@2008alberta]

hackers are paying attention, i'm sure ...

[@Nova2Yung]

The whole IT team at a particular company will be undergoing investigation 👀

[@iodian]

CEO of Crowdstrike should invest in a suit and tie. He looks like he is on a zoom from Hawaii.

[@im.empimp]

I'd rather he focus on fixing the immediate problem, the system problem that led to the immediate problem, and communicating those fixes than have him worry about a suit and tie.

[@ST-rj8iu]

clothes do not make the man. smart and humble people are not concerned with image. they are concerned with providing value.

[@LovetheSource]

Ah yes thats definitely the "CEO" and he totally has control over....something? Or is he just a puppet to be taken at face value by news watchers

[@Crismodin]

Millennials checking their bingo card for CrowdStrike update.

[@chadng1368]

My computer frogged up too, blue screen and keep rebooting for nothing. Can not even fix it.

[@Olleeal]

Read the solution on the Internet. It is very simple, or call a local Windows support, they will help you.

[@allangibson8494]

@@OlleealThe “solution” on the internet won’t work for most corporations - because safe mode is locked out by corporate security policies. Full system reload is required.

[@RMX7777]

​@@allangibson8494You can just force the PC to boot from a flashdrive and remove the bad driver via command prompt.

[@AlexR_44]

@@allangibson8494 What? You can't "lock out" safemode, but you do often need physical access to enter it.

[@valentinomc]

I am wondering why the entire world is using Windows.

[@ronuiux]

Maybe, Legacy and dependency software is the reasons why.

[@valentinomc]

​@@Jeffrey-s9n I don't think Windows was ever the best. People use it because it was easily accessible and free to use in the Windows XP era, so they became accustomed to it. Okay, the issue wasn't caused by Windows, but by something installed within it. As for Apple, I believe they don't want to replace Windows globally for too many reasons.

[@debrajorgensen2730]

Owned by Bill Gates

[@Olleeal]

​@@valentinomcin terms of security it is not better but it is easier and cheaper for users. And better in big scale of managment of workstation in companies.

[@birdstwin1186]

@@valentinomc Being easily accessible among other reasons means it is the best. Accessibility is a quality.

[@simonsheaharris]

How could one man have that much power .... bro just shut down the world 🌎

[@kimberlyjimenezc3713]

My flight was delayed 6 hrs yesterday so glad I’m home!

[@991122bc]

This is management issue, not technical, good patch policy approach would have prevent this from happening 🎉

[@felixyoghurt3291]

Agreed. Wonder if they are following agile way of doing things

[@GH-oi2jf]

I'm flying in two weeks. Relieved that I missed it.

[@rayrwyr]

Nothing comes close to this one.

[@manchu-qu9mw]

Mayhem. Insane mess all because of an update.

[@CannibaLouiST]

is crowdstrike preinstalled in all windows 11 computers?

[@allangibson8494]

No but bitlocker is - no bitlocker USB key, no safe mode, by by data on machine. Wipe and reload image.

[@RMX7777]

No, it's a paid cyber security service.

[@Noobmaster69_bro]

It looks like dumb patch push . It can be master minded by a hacker as well . Just say, even crowd strike has no clue

[@peterdobson3435]

That's just a bit hyperbolic. Computers haven't really been around all that long when it comes to overall human history. So, to say that it is the biggest outage in history is not that big a deal. If they were around for hundreds of years, then maybe that would be something of a big statement.

[@Abaddon231]

That's true .. they have only been around about 50 yrs .. But nearly every human being has one and depends on it in some way or another , whether it be banking , health, services , bills or work .. they may he new , but we have grown dependent on them

[@peterdobson3435]

@@Abaddon231 That is why the emotional outburst expressed in the title. But when you step away from the feelings, reality is not quite so dramatic in the vastness of human history. Because of our dependence on them, we have become drama queens when it is temporarily taken away and it inconveniences us in a relatively small way.

[@yoloswaggins1579]

Me chilling at home😐🍿

[@jorgealvarez247]

Worst day at work ever! It started with a call with another colleague then in the middle of the call my laptop collapsed in blue screen and then restarting in an endless loop of bsods. I freaked out and went office from home office and end up looping blue screens until at 13.00 local it solved my problem, they had to go one by one laptop users. More than 7 hours delays in my reports and planners complaining across Europe, I dreamed today with that blue screen of the death

[@adrianrodriquez1218]

So anyone that works with any kind of tech from printers to cars as an IT type person knows to TURN OFF Auto updates...... its like a security kinda thing............ Id fire any IT person of mine in charge of this ....

[@allangibson8494]

Turning this update off isn’t possible because it goes on below the windows operating system. CrowdStrike operates at that low a level.

[@RMX7777]

You don't cancel auto updates for cyber security though. You're literally paying them to stay on top of things for you.

[@Ray-g3g]

Definitely got hacked

[@neilt4168]

This doesn't affect personal computers so I don't why people commenting about their Sony Playstation, Xbox, and Mac computers being fine.

[@Olleeal]

Affect personal computers that uses Windows. You know, aside the US many people uses that for personal porpuse around the world

[@buttonman1831]

And this is what we are stuck with because Microsoft completely owns the operating system market for PC's.

[@danmilosevich]

There are other O.S. just as good as windows.

[@buttonman1831]

@@danmilosevich I don't think Windows is good but if you want to be able to do everything. I like Linux and made many distributions, but it can be complicated and takes years to use truly effectively but it has limited support for games. Mac OS is much better than Windows for a general purpose operating system but again, it sucks for gaming. No operating system has the level of functionality that windows has.

[@dashawnsmith6010]

Skynet

[@Cooscoop]

This is the effect of a company being to large.

[@cm5489]

Layers of management will identify a scapegoat

[@felixyoghurt3291]

They will also come up with a rebrand to fix the company image very smartly

[@nospamallowed4890]

The responsible individuals are the CEO and the board. They are the ones that define and cause the development prwctices of the company and pressure people into recklessness. Software development is supposed to be methodical, with no distractions or interruptions, to help avoid mistakes. People are supposed to get proper ongoing training and support to ensure they get the k owledge needed for new products and techniques that they are asked to use. And QA is supposed to be thorough, not just a "just for show" exercise. And yet... most companies no longer do any of that, but rather protect themselves with legalese.

[@absorbintelligence56]

And they want to depend on Ai🤦🏽‍♂️

[@ChineseKiwi]

0:05 - That is from the Australian ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation), not Sky News.

[@diannawatkins1723]

How did people ever survive without PCs before the 80s? We need to go back, hire humans & be safer.

[@sonicgalaxy27]

I checked my Windows PC and I didn't get no crowd strike outage yet.😅

[@danmilosevich]

Are you using crowdstrike?

[@ImAntifurries]

This shows how we rely too much on technology

[@thelovelyjmo]

What we understand is the crowdstrike update was Flawed in how they accessed the system.... sounds suspicious. Not an attack but sure looks and sounds like one!!!

[@voyager6063]

Crowdstrike is owned by Blackrock and Vanguard . This is the real threat , not the company itself.

[@strinejr]

Bingo!

[@annmarie_]

💯% something is going on.

[@paxundpeace9970]

Yeah but they together only hold 15% of stocks and most of them for ETFs those are owned by millions of people around the world.

[@damham5689]

Seems like everything is owned by Vanguard and Blackrock these days.

[@jogmas12]

Crowd strike is public owned company. Vanguard owns many shares of the company

[@kyuirah]

But which key is the any key?

[@dunamiswihmee]

Maybe…just maybe…stop FORCING UPDATES!? Looking at you Microsoft!!

[@annmaryjohn3258]

So nobody uses ESET NOD32 ANTIVIRUS anymore?

[@BERSERKTHIRD]

like all over the world? I live in the UE and nothing happened here. Windows is running...

[@RMX7777]

Only affected businesses using CrowdStrike software.

[@allangibson8494]

It was the corporate servers and secure clients that had the biggest problems. CloudStrike is a corporate security package.

[@Olleeal]

Because crowd released the update during the down. Powered off machines during the update windows were not affected. That's why many many airport were affected

[@BERSERKTHIRD]

@@Olleeal I understand, I've actually had a problem with updating Windows for a year now :D

[@Digital111]

I think it’s only if you had the update installed I live in NA and nothing happened to my Windows but the app for my work schedule was down.

[@kevinjenner9502]

Thank god Crowdstrike has liability insurance.

[@jcy089]

Finest example of Made in America. First the Boeing fiasco and now Microsoft ending the world 😂

[@bradisbell]

Did you watch the video? Has nothing to do with Microsoft. This is a bug in CrowdStrike's software.

[@banwa_non]

@@bradisbell Then how come Linux servers aren't affected?

[@bradisbell]

@@banwa_non Because the bug was in CrowdStrike's Windows agent, not their Linux agent.

[@deekang6244]

Kakao went down in Korea about a year ago. Which pretty much affected everyone. Literally every single person’s money, phones, messaging, banking, transportation and more. Took about 14 hours to fix.

[@peekaboots01]

Starbucks was offline this morning.

[@SG-oy1sj]

How nobody never heard of crowd strike though ?

[@junecrochetfavourites6616]

Didn't even know that this had happened, only because a friend was watching TV that he told us , glad im not worried if everything crashes, i keep cash and don't have a computer, or TV ....

[@patkelley4071]

Notice that Apple computers were not affected. Windows machines have been at the heart of every major computer systems failure for decades. Microsoft has great salesmen, but a lousy product.

[@timothymclain]

Looks at my Mac. Smiles.

[@applec.397]

Who should pay for the loss?

[@GH-oi2jf]

The vulnerability is this: 1. vast numbers of systems use the same platform. 2. most of those (it seems) will install kernel-privileged software upon receipt. This only happened on such a large scale because IT managers are too trusting of software updates which have the potential to cause harm. I use an iPad, mostly. Now and then, Apple notifies me of an update to IOS, the operating system. I am never in a hurry to install it. I might be weeks or months behind the updates. If there is something wrong with an update, I will read about it before I install it. I did avoid one bad update by being cautious.

[@moonshoes11]

From a different perspective, when you say “too trusting” I’d point to the success rate of all previous updates.

[@deekang6244]

Yup. I wait a day or two.

[@JackyWHC01]

So there's must be some problem during the UAT, how come they can pass the UAT??

[@BabsKaz]

We'll never know. Ever.

[@brookyogini6625]

Glad that I still run windows 10 that has no update service.

[@PatrickBaptist]

I think it is a attack, the "security" firm would hate to admit this was one as it would hurt their image more than releasing an update that wasn't tested and basically behaved EXACTLY like a virus. So either they were hacked or the did the hack, they can pick one, but only one.

[@RodneyWolfram]

man Crowdstrike is soooo gona get sued out of existence (they might want go bankrupt now and save time and effort)

[@marting4042]

Using a clip from an Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) news report that has a Sky News (Murdoch News Corp) watermark in the top left is tantamount to the greatest insult you could possibly have made in respect of the Australian national public broadcaster. Appalling sourcing NBC!

[@blairamroberts]

Thank you! I saw that immediately and got very annoyed that they would state that ABC was Sky. The two are very different. I applaud your comment!

[@GilletteFarm]

“Protection that powers you”🤣

[@stevensalazar2713]

Had an important court date today made my flight Thursday morning

[@agoogleuseranonymous2658]

Then I keep hearing from Schmoes "Oh traveling changes your perspective on life". I bet it does now.

[@ashleydonohoe7941]

This is always why you should always have a backup way besides computers to do jobs.

[@teemo5409]

I think it was set-up to do just what it did 😮❗ Let CrowdStrike see just what kind of influence this "outage" would have 😕

[@cavinshakesheave9938]

Do you believe this story of how this happened?

[@gwgux]

Yes. This has been verified by multiple experts and the very people working on fixing all the crashed computers. I've been working in IT for over 20 years. This was always 100% possible to happen and here we are living in the reality that it happened. When so many systems run the same combination of software for the operating system and the security software, all those systems can be hit with the exact same issue. Computers are great about being consistent like that.

[@GrimYak]

Just because you dont understand it doesn’t mean its not real

[@grizzlo7300]

LOL, OF COURSE NOT

[@deekang6244]

Yes. I was in Korea when Kakao went down. Kakao is a big computer system. It took down banks, personal money, phones, messaging, transportation and more. Everything there is done on your phone, so it was a big deal. I think that was unprecedented, and it about a year ago. It took more than 14 hours to fix. Everyone was in a dither about it because people don’t deal in cash.

[@cavinshakesheave9938]

@@gwgux did you take all the jabs too?

[@joycesmith8120]

Unreal

[@sawdustismanglitter6]

if this outage has caused you to miss work then think about how real your job is? if the power goes out are you sol, or like a contractor or farmer can you goto work?

[@markfcoble]

Crowdstrike is the enemy, is it not obvious? It's all fine, right?

[@sunnydaze5721]

So late…

[@wendysalinas5602]

The blue screen of death 💀 bruh

[@IAT1964]

HAHAHAHA. and murika has banned Kaspersky. Crowdstrike should be sued by companies all over the world for loss of earnings.

[@blairamroberts]

That first news clip was from Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) News... Not Sky News. Please get your sources right. Appalling that NBC would get something as simple as that wrong. Comparing ABC News Australia to Sky News is an insult.

[@allengreg5447]

BSOD: AKA "Kernel Panic." DON'T USE WINDOWS!

[@allangibson8494]

Linux and Mac have the same problem if their version of CloudStrike is installed. Windows got an empty file as an update. The Linux and Mac version didn’t.

[@Dro-m7p]

Looks like it's a cover up , someone was trying to do things off the books so it could disappear 🤫🤫🤫

[@obsoletepowercorrupts]

Notice how many vertical screens are affected. Windows-Phone is no longer a thing, so thank goodness all those smartphone owner people who film vertically are not affected. The love we all have for people who film vertically knows no bounds, and perish the thought that the ability to film vertically _(such that they have to hold the phone in landscape mode instead of portrait mode to film)_ might be countermanded by some technical glitch, since it would be too much to bear. At least that exact precise glitch event _(stopping the portrait filming)_ is not happening and so we can all be glad it is most certainly definitely not that 100% tragedy occurring _(like, say, any time now for instance)._ Filming vertically is almost a human right now. My comment has no hate in it and I do no harm. I am not appalled or afraid, boasting or envying or complaining... Just saying. Psalms23: Giving thanks and praise to the Lord and peace and love. Also, I'd say Matthew6.

[@miskwainini]

Conveniently coming on the heels of the ICJ ruling, with an Israeli loyalist CEO and numerous Israeli vendors who all have ties to the IDF and Mossad as national policy.

[@stev838]

It’s called the ten days of darkness

[@waeljallad671]

Aspen security forum activities not affected

[@orionzzz]

Companies need to build on icp blockchain

[@greyjedi75]

A.Jones called it out on 14 july 2024 Tim Dillon Show

[@JayandSarah]

Hilarious stuff. We live overseas and have had no impact. Mac user here.

[@nomoredarts8918]

It's Y2K problem with a lag

[@Digital111]

Quarter of a century late 😅

[@derfiemcgoo9673]

Hey guys, I’ve got a great idea for our critical infrastructure: let’s make sure that our critical infrastructure runs on Microsoft Windows and also let’s go ahead and connect it to the civilian worldwide web!

[@bradfordjhart]

Oh my God it affected people at the airport. Those people are rich. They shouldn't have to put up with that. Also hospitals and everything else was affected but their not rich subtext 🙄

[@morebaileyskim]

I think it might be a lot easier for them to film in an airport (pre security) than in a hospital. I’m just guessing though. 🤷

[@Diego-nebot]

It said rizz

[@Thomass7586]

No internet sounds good😅

[@Weout-c6i]

Oh here we go with data breach lawsuits it’s starting to pile up when are they going to hire real talent