CrowdStrike and Microsoft: all the latest news on the global IT outage

Microsoft has released a recovery tool that’s designed to help IT admins repair Windows machines that were impacted by CrowdStrike’s faulty update that crashed 8.5 million Windows devices on Friday. The tool creates a bootable USB drive that IT admins can use to help quickly recover impacted machines.

While CrowdStrike has issued an update to fix its software that led to millions of Blue Screen of Death errors, not all machines are able to automatically receive that fix. Some IT admins have reported rebooting PCs multiple times will get the necessary update, but for others the only route is having to manually boot into Safe Mode and deleting the problematic CrowdStrike update file.

CrowdStrike’s faulty update caused a worldwide tech disaster that affected 8.5 million Windows devices on Friday, according to Microsoft. Microsoft says that’s “less than one percent of all Windows machines,” but it was enough to create problems for retailers, banks, airlines, and many other industries, as well as everyone who relies on them.

Separately, the technical breakdown from CrowdStrike released Friday explains more about what happened and why so many systems were affected all at once.

A faulty update from cybersecurity provider CrowdStrike is responsible for a global IT outage leading to some truly unique imagery of blue screens. From the screens in Times Square in New York to airports and banks globally, this outage has everyone seeing blue.

If you have a photo of a Blue Screen of Death and want to share, please reach out! We’ll be updating this post as images come in.

Have you turned it off and on again? That familiar refrain from IT departments and The IT Crowd is being echoed by Microsoft today as a recommended way of fixing the faulty CrowdStrike update that has taken down thousands of Windows PCs and servers today.

In a support note on Microsoft’s Azure outage page, the company says it has heard from customers that rebooting virtual machines and PCs multiple times can help. “We have received feedback from customers that several reboots (as many as 15 have been reported) may be required, but overall feedback is that reboots are an effective troubleshooting step at this stage,” says Microsoft.

Look, in the grand scheme of the global outage that’s wreaking havoc across airlines, banks, supermarkets, TV stations, and countless businesses, being unable to order a Trenta iced coffee from Starbucks with my smartphone is a minor inconvenience. But you can add the company’s mobile ordering system to the list of casualties from this CrowdStrike BSOD situation.

The Starbucks app itself is working, but the ability to order ahead is currently unavailable at all locations. It looks as though some Starbucks shops have (temporarily) closed altogether to avoid dealing with this tech hassle until the situation improves.

On Friday morning, some of the biggest airlines, TV broadcasters, banks, and other essential services came to a standstill as a massive outage rippled across the globe. The outage, which has brought the Blue Screen of Death upon legions of Windows machines across the globe, is linked to just one software company: CrowdStrike.

CrowdStrike plays an important role in helping companies find and prevent security breaches, billing itself as having the “fastest mean time” to detect threats. Since its launch in 2011, the Texas-based company has helped investigate major cyberattacks, such as the Sony Pictures hack in 2014, as well as the Russian cyberattacks on the Democratic National Committee in 2015 and 2016. As of Thursday evening, CrowdStrike’s valuation was upwards of $83 billion.

IT admins around the world are scrambling to fix a major issue with Windows computers today after a faulty update from cybersecurity provider CrowdStrike knocked thousands of PCs and servers offline with a Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) error. While CrowdStrike has fixed the update that originally caused the problems, many systems are still offline, with banks, airlines, supermarkets, and TV broadcasters struggling to cope without their machines.

The fix, for many, won’t be easy. IT admins are still trying to use an initial workaround provided by CrowdStrike, which involves booting Windows systems into Safe Mode and deleting a system file:

Thousands of flights were temporarily grounded Friday after a major global IT outage caused airline computers to become inoperable. Some flights were resuming Friday morning, but airlines were warning customers of delays and disruptions throughout the day.

The outage apparently stemmed from a software update issued by major US cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, which is widely used by businesses for managing security on Windows PCs — including by most major airlines.