CrowdStrike

Early in the morning on 19 July 2024, it became clear that a major IT issue had hit infrastructure and services globally, with healthcare, financial services, banking and aviation all affected from the glitch.

Shutting down systems globally: what exactly happened?

The IT glitch originated from cyber security organization CrowdStrike, who confirmed the issue and stated that it came from a “defect” in a content update for its Microsoft Windows users, specifically, according to CrowdStrike’s CEO, a “defect in a single content update for Windows hosts” – in summary, a flaw in a software update that was pushed out to CrowdStrike’s customers using Windows PCs.

The resulting chaos was widespread and profound and resulted in flights being grounded, the rail network grinding to a halt, healthcare services were affected including many doctors surgeries, prescription collections were affected and online payment systems were shut down – even the London Stock Exchange was affected. It even affected some broadcasting organisations; Sky News in particular was forced off the air as a result of the IT glitch.

The flaw contained in the update caused many Windows PCs to crash, and many displayed the well-known “blue screen of death” and became unstable. Around the world the IT infrastructure at many institutions and organisations collapsed, thus causing their online systems to be taken offline.

What is the scale of the IT glitch and the impact of it?

Just some of the ways that the IT glitch was impacting organisations included:

• The disruption of the majority of GP surgeries – the NHS issued a statement saying that patients should attend appointments unless contacted to say otherwise and to only contact their GP surgery in very urgent cases.
• According to the National Pharmacy Association, services in community pharmacies were affected including the access of prescription drugs and medicine deliveries.
• Sky News was even briefly taken off air and then returned to broadcasting at a reduced capacity.
• Many retailers reported issues with online payments.
• The London Stock Exchange reported problems, although trading continued as normal.
• At airports around the world, flights were grounded due to being unable to process passengers and some airlines had to manually check in their customers. Some even recommended that passengers should not attempt to check in bags, and large queues formed at airports in the UK.
•  Rail services were also disrupted with ticketing services at some stations impacted.
  

How has CrowdStrike responded?

The CEO of CrowdStrike, George Kurtz, said that CrowdStrike was “actively working” with those impacted.

He confirmed that the outage was not a “security incident or cyberattack” and that the issue had been “identified” and “isolated” and a “fix has been deployed”. However, he urged their customers to keep checking CrowdStrike’s support portal for assistance and updates. He added his team was “fully mobilised to ensure the security and stability of CrowdStrike customers”.

It is currently not clear how long it will take CrowdStrike to rectify the situation. Some are speculating that it could take days or even weeks to fully get on top of.

Simon Johnson, CEO & Founder at HOOP Cyber said: “This incident has had a profound effect on many of the public services and digital connectivity we rely on day to day, and should serve as a reminder of the importance of resilient infrastructure. The team at HOOP have been in touch with a number of our customers, and are ready to offer any support we can – if you have any concerns or would like some advice please feel free to get in touch – .