According to a Microsoft blog post, a global outage triggered by a faulty update from cybersecurity provider CrowdStrike impacted around 8.5 million Windows devices. This update caused systems to experience a blue screen of death, resulting in temporary interruptions for hospitals, airlines, banks, and other critical services. The problem was confined solely to Windows machines.
By Friday afternoon, the majority of the problems had been resolved, but both Microsoft and CrowdStrike continued to address the repercussions. In a Saturday blog post, David Weston, Microsoft’s VP of Enterprise and OS Security, stated that Microsoft is collaborating with CrowdStrike to develop a scalable solution.
This solution aims to expedite a fix for CrowdStrike’s faulty update within Microsoft’s Azure infrastructure. Additionally, Microsoft has enlisted assistance from Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
CrowdStrike explained in its own blog post on Saturday that the problematic update was a sensor configuration update intended to target newly identified malicious named pipes used in cyberattacks.
However, for devices running Windows 7.11 and above with CrowdStrike’s Falcon sensor, the update caused a logic error, resulting in operating system crashes. Despite the widespread impact, David Weston noted that the affected devices represented less than one percent of all Windows machines.
Both companies are focused on rectifying the situation and preventing future incidents. The collaboration between Microsoft, CrowdStrike, AWS, and GCP underscores the importance of a coordinated response in addressing and mitigating the impact of such significant technical issues on essential services.