Outages Hit Banks, Hospitals, Airlines Around the World

A global technology outage disrupted the state DMV offices, some banks, airlines and other institutions Friday morning but by mid-afternoon, at least some had begun to recover.

Some, such as the Town of Huntington, averted problems. “As a precaution, we shut our system down and so didn’t have any adverse issues from the software upgrade,” Christine Geed, communications director for the town, said.

Friday morning, Northwell Health said, “ Northwell Health is currently experiencing sporadic technology impacts due to a global issue caused by a faulty update from a third-party cybersecurity provider, CrowdStrike. Where needed, we have implemented standard emergency response procedures to ensure the continued quality of care and safety of our patients.”

Crowdstrike, the company whose software update caused the outages, rolled back the changes, but not before serious damage had already occurred.

A software expert on the platform X , Troy Hunt, said,  “I don’t think it’s too early to call it: this will be the largest IT outage in history,” said security expert Troy Hunt.

The MTA said that customer service information lines were knocked offline temporarily but that bus and train service was unaffected.