GLOBAL IT OUTAGE UPDATES: 'Critical services remain up and running' in NYC, but major disruptions at airports

NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) -- The New York area was being impacted by a global technology outage on Friday, with airports facing hundreds of flight disruptions but New York City's emergency services and critical infrastructure functioning as normal.

Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike said the issue—which affected Microsoft 365 apps and services—wasn't a security incident or cyberattack. The problem nevertheless caused escalating disruptions worldwide that continued hours after the company said it was gradually fixing it.

While basic services in NYC—such as 911, 311, the water system and mass transit—were up and running, the outage had the potential to impact various services and apps for airlines, transit agencies, banks, telecommunications providers, retail giants and healthcare systems. Everything from flight cancellations to Starbucks ordering issues were reported.

HERE'S THE LATEST:

1 p.m. -- HOCHUL: 911 working statewide as transportation services struggle

Gov. Kathy Hochul updated New Yorkers on the status of emergency services, confirming that while internal computer systems in some counties have been impacted, New Yorkers in all 62 counties are able to call 911.

"Multiple counties have notified our Office of Emergency Management that their internal computer systems have been impacted, and thankfully, all of them have backup systems for situations like this," the governor said.

Major disruptions have been reported at the New York State DMV, Hochul said. The agency's official account posted on X just before 1 p.m. updating New Yorkers on its status, stating that online transactions are functioning but some in-person transactions remain unavailable.

Port Authority itself isn't impacted, individual airlines are. Hochul encouraged New Yorkers to check flight information before continuing on to the airport.

As of 1 p.m., according to Flight Aware, 326 flights were delayed at JFK Airpor t, 356 at LaGuardia Airport and 379 at Newark Airport.

The MTA remains fully operational, excluding certain tech features like countdown clocks and the MTA app.

"This is an obviously incredibly disruptive event caused by a third party vendor," Hochul said. "We'll continue working around the clock to restore services as soon as possible, and we'll continue to keep New Yorkers updated on our progress."

12:15 p.m. -- NY state courts assessing impacts of outage

In a statement, Al Baker, a spokesperson for New York state's Office of Court Administration, said there were "no significant disruptions" to in-person court operations but "interactivity issues" were still being worked out.

"Our technology and software analysts are hard at work assessing the Unified Court System’s digital networks and infrastructure to try to diagnose the potential impacts and deliver solutions to the widespread Microsoft outage issues that have emerged today," Baker said.

"While no significant disruptions to in-person, courthouse operations are being confronted so far, our technology professionals are still in the preliminary stages of their work to assist staff around the state with disrupted interactivity issues. The Court, and its employees, are working collaboratively with all stakeholders through this crisis and remain committed to ensuring the highest levels of justice delivery and access to our judiciary system across New York State."

12 p.m. -- Memorial Sloan Kettering impacted by outage

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center on the Upper East Side was impacted by the outage, the hospital said in a statement.

"MSK is having systems issues as a result of a worldwide technical disruption," the statement said. "We have procedures to ensure we can continue to provide safe, high-quality care to our patients."

"At this time, we are pausing the start of any procedure that requires anesthesia," the statement continued. "We are in the process of calling patients with appointments that are affected. If you have not been notified, please proceed to your scheduled appointment."

11 a.m. -- Over 1,000 flights canceled or delayed at NYC area airports

As of 11 a.m., there were more than 750 flight delays and 320 cancellations at New York's three major airports, according to FlightAware. It's unclear exactly how many of those were due to the IT outage, but those are unusually high numbers, and some airlines have issued ground stops.

The disruptions includes more than 200 flight delays at JFK Airport, 250 at LaGuardia Airport and nearly 300 at Newark Airport. There were over 70 cancellations at JFK, 145 cancellations at LaGuardia and over 100 cancellations at Newark.

10:15 a.m. -- NYC officials give briefing, say critical services working

At a 10 a.m. briefing from City Hall, Mayor Eric Adams said he received a preliminary briefing after midnight about the issue and that the "blueprint was already in place" when the day started, with the different agencies working together to minimize the impact on New Yorkers.

"CrowdStrike sent a software update that inadvertently took systems offline," Adams said. "This was not a cyberattack, this was not a cyber hit on our city infrastructure."

The mayor said emergency services, the water system, traffic lights and other critical infrastructure was not impacted. The Summer Rising school programs were also taking place.

"We expect to continue to see cascading effects of the outage throughout the day, but the NYC Office of Technology and Innovation will be doing everything possible to minimize potential service disruptions and restore service to systems as soon as possible," Adams said.

NYC Chief Technology Officer Matthew Fraser said that around 12:20 a.m. the city's cyber command "started to see impacts on systems across the city manifesting in different places."

The office contacted partners at Microsoft and CrowdStrike, which stopped deploying the patch and reverted to an old version, limiting the number of machines impacted in the city. However, the fix requires "physical touch" to the impacted computers, so it will take some time to get them back up and running, Fraser said.

There were no major impacts to 311, 911, the FDNY or NYPD, Fraser said. All hospitals across the city were also functional. "Our most critical services remain up and running and we have a pathway to recovery to bring everything else up," he said. Asked if there were any impacts at all to emergency services, he said, "there are no impacts to calls for support."

MTA chair Janno Lieber said the subway, buses, LIRR and Metro-North were on schedule, with the main impact customer-facing countdown clocks on the lettered subway lines. Tolls are also working at the bridges and tunnels. "The airline system may be in disarray, but New York City's public transit system is going full speed," Lieber said.

9:15 a.m. -- NY and NJ governors release statements

The offices of both Gov. Kathy Hochul and Gov. Phil Murphy said they were aware of the issue and monitoring its impact on critical infrastructure as work was done to fix it. "We do not yet have a timeline for full restoration," New York State chief cyber officer Colin Ahern said.

8:45 a.m. -- NYSE to operate as normal

The New York Stock Exchange said it was fully operational and expected a normal morning.

8:30 a.m. -- City Hall says mayor was briefed, emergency services up

City Hall spokesman Fabien Levy wrote on X: "We’re aware of the global technical outage involving CrowdStrike and are currently assessing the full impact it may have on city operations. At this time, critical infrastructure and emergency operations, including the 911 call system, have not been impacted."

Citywide guidance was being sent out to all agencies, with city IT departments making the issue top priority on Friday. "To be clear, we currently have no reason to believe this is anything other than a bad update from CrowdStrike," Levy said.

8 a.m. -- Airports report delays, cancellations, ground stops

Airports seemed to be the hardest hit—all three major airports in the area reported issues, including delays and cancellations. Individual airlines were especially impacted, with some issuing ground stops or canceling flights. Travelers should check with their airline.

7:45 a.m. -- MTA service unaffected, but display screens impacted

MTA trains and buses appeared to be unaffected, but some station announcements and display screens were having problems. Train arrival times were also unavailable for most subway lines, though service was normal.

The MTA said: "Some MTA customer information systems are temporarily offline due to a worldwide technical outage. Train and bus service is unaffected. Please listen for announcements in your station, on your train, or on your bus."

Service on commuter rail lines like the LIRR, Metro-North and NJ Transit didn't appear to be impacted, though LIRR and Metro-North information systems—like station announcements and platform signs—as well as NJ Transit ticket vending machines were said to be temporarily offline.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.