IT-disruption paralyzes flights, gas stations, and banks in many countries
Public life is largely at a standstill in many countries. Reports of severe disruptions have emerged from Australia, Great Britain, the USA, and India.
A technical issue apparently with Microsoft is causing significant disruptions to public life in several countries. Reports are currently coming in from Australia, Germany, Great Britain, Spain, the USA, and India. Banks, airports, gas stations, supermarket chains, train services, and television broadcasters are among those affected. They are currently unable to offer their services.
In Germany, a technical problem at Berlin Airport led to the suspension of air traffic. A spokesperson for the airport told ntv.de that it is expected that no planes will be able to take off or land before 10 am. According to RBB, there was a server failure at Berlin Airport. It is unclear whether this is related to the problems at Microsoft.
Shortly before 10 am, Hamburg Airport also reported a disruption. Four airlines, according to a spokesperson, were affected in Hamburg: Eurowings, Ryanair, Vueling, and Turkish Airlines. The airlines were initially issuing tickets manually. Lufthansa also reported problems with its systems. There may be delays and individual failures, it was reported. However, a spokesperson for Frankfurt Airport stated that all systems were running and the flight operations were being carried out without interruption.
University Hospital Schleswig-Holstein announced the cancellation of all planned operations at its Kiel and Lübeck locations for Friday.
"We are aware of an issue"
Worldwide, companies are working with the software offerings of the US technology conglomerate Microsoft. The company reports that a technical problem has caused a global outage of Microsoft 365. "We are investigating an issue that affects the ability of users to access various Microsoft 365 applications and services," Microsoft states on platform X. The company observes a "positive trend in service availability."
Users are also reporting problems with an update from the cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike on various platforms. "We are aware of a widespread issue that causes errors on Windows computers in various sensor versions," a Crowdstrike representative stated online. According to reports, such as from the economic portal Bloomberg, this problem caused the problem at Microsoft.
"We apologize for the interruption"
The most significant disruptions are currently being reported from Great Britain and Australia. For example, the British news channel Sky News had to halt its broadcast. On a screenshot, viewers could read only: "We apologize for the interruption. We hope to be able to resume transmission soon."
In Australia, all monitors reportedly went down at the ABC News TV station. A similar problem was reported at airports in Sydney and Melbourne. Several airlines are currently unable to offer check-in services. Several Australian banks also reported that their payment systems were affected by the disruption and could not process transactions.
In the USA, American Airlines, United, and Delta reportedly requested a "global flight stop for all flights" from the US aviation authority. In Japan, approximately 30 percent of McDonald's restaurants had to close prematurely due to technical problems. The Irish budget airline Ryanair reported IT problems that were beyond its control.
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Microsoft's IT issue also impacted services at Berlin Brandenburg Airport - BER, causing temporary suspension of flights. The Australian economy suffered significant disruptions as well, with several banks and Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) news stations experiencing IT problems. Microsoft has acknowledged a global outage of Microsoft 365 and is investigating the cause.
