CrowdStrike Windows IT outage: CEO ‘deeply sorry’ for global chaos caused by Microsoft update and warns fix may take ‘some time’ to work

2.01pm BST

Airports, health services and US firms knocked offline

Airports, health services and businesses across the US have been knocked offline by the Microsoft outage caused by a CrowdStrike software update. Here’s what we know so far about impacts on the US:

• The Federal Aviation Administration shut down operations due to the outage. There were about 110,000 commercial flights scheduled worldwide on Friday. By 6am ET, nearly 1,400 of them had been cancelled, according to reports.

• The FAA said that it is “closely monitoring a technical issue impacting IT systems at US airlines.” It added: “Several airlines have requested FAA assistance with ground stops until the issue is resolved.”

• Long lines were forming at major US airports, as New York, Atlanta, Dallas and Chicago airports were among those facing major delays as airlines struggled to process travelers. NBC news reports departure screens and check-in systems have failed and delays are expected to keep going up.

• In Alaska, 911 services were affected by the CrowdStrike outage. State troopers wrote : “Due to a nationwide technology-related outage, many 911 and non-emergency call centers are not working correctly across the state of Alaska.”

• The White House said that it is “looking into” the outage , according to a spokesperson speaking to CNN. “We’re aware of the incident and are looking into the issue and impacts,” the full statement said.

• New York City’s subway system agency, the MTA, said that “some MTA customer information systems are temporarily offline due to a worldwide technical outage”. It added that train and bus service is unaffected.

You can follow the latest here:

Related: Microsoft Windows IT outage: US airlines, 911 services and businesses hit by CrowdStrike disruption – live

1.29pm BST

Travellers have been describing “mayhem” and “chaos” at Edinburgh Airport, as those whose flights have been cancelled are being urged to leave the airport to avoid overcrowding , reports our Scotland correspondent Libby Brooks .

Passengers have been posting images of snaking queues and hallways rammed with waiting travellers. The airport is also urging would-be passengers not to travel to the airport without checking the status of their flights first.

Scotland’s other airports so far remain largely unaffected, with a small number of airlines moving to manual check ins and some shops are only accepting cash payments.

Train services in Scotland are also unaffected at present: Scotrail says:

Train services are operating normally, and we are working with industry partners to understand the cause and undertake further checks to all our systems.

A few football clubs have warned that their ticketing systems are under pressure, with Celtic FC announcing they are postponing ticket sales, as did Manchester United in England.

1.24pm BST

CrowdStrike chief executive 'deeply sorry' for global impact of flawed software update

George Kurtz, the founder and chief executive of the cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, has said the company is “deeply sorry for impact that we’ve caused to customers” after a flawed software update prompted a global IT outage.

Kurtz told NBC’s Today Show in the US that the problem was down to a bug in a single update. “We identified this very quickly and remediated the issue,” he said, adding that CrowdStrike was now “working with each and every customer to make sure that we can bring them back online”.

Kurtz said there had been a “negative interaction” between the update and Microsoft’s operating system, which had then caused computers to crash, sparking the global outage, which remains ongoing.

Asked how one faulty update could cause such global chaose, he said: “We have to go back and see what happened here, our systems are always looking for the latest attacks from adversaries that that are out there.”

He made clear that there was no possibilty it was a cyber-attack. However, although the problem had been identified and a fix issued, Kurtz said “it could be some time for some systems” to return to normal, stressing that they would not “just automatically recover”.

Updated at 1.59pm BST

1.12pm BST

Royal Mail is experiencing technical issues across some of its IT systems as part of the outage.

The UK postal service operator said its inbound customer service phone lines are not operating at present, and some of the applications that its customer experience and account teams use are not currently available.

It said collection, processing and delivery of items across UK is taking place as usual, though there may be some impact on services, while Royal Mail shipping solutions, including click and drop, are working normally for customers to print labels and send items.

Updated at 1.22pm BST

1.06pm BST

The National Health Service’s blood donation agency has urged people in Britain to keep their appointments to give blood , saying it had been contacted by members of the public wondering if sessions they were still going ahead amid reports of the IT outage hitting some NHS services .

A spokesman said:

NHS Blood and Transplant are calling on donors to book and keep appointments to donate blood to boost NHS resilience at this time.

There remains a particularly urgent need for O negative blood. Blood donation systems are not affected and we currently have a high number of appointments available at our donor centres in major towns and cities.

Updated at 1.22pm BST

12.59pm BST

Today’s global Microsoft IT outage could impact company payroll and the ability for businesses across the nation to pay their employees.

Melanie Pizzey , CEO and gounder of the Global Payroll Association, said:

We’ve been contacted by numerous clients already today who have been unable to access their payroll software due to the Microsoft outage and others who have been urged to log out with immediate effect.

Depending on the length of this outage, it could have very serious implications for businesses across the nation, particularly those who process payroll on a weekly basis. Furthermore, we could see a backlog with regard to processing payrolls for the coming month end which may delay employees from receiving their monthly wage.

At best, it will require those managing payroll to work overtime to rectify the issue, but the good news is that it doesn’t seem to be a cyber attack. This means that the sensitive employee details held within payroll should be safe, although we’re seeing many companies understandably take action to minimise such a threat as a precaution.

12.51pm BST

The worldwide IT crisis was discussed by UK government officials who attended a meeting of the Cobra emergency committee, as we reported earlier .

The meeting heard there has been no known impact on 999 or emergency services.

The prime minister did not attend the Cobra meeting as he was hosting the Ukrainian president at a meeting the Cabinet at the time.

A spokesperson for Keir Starmer said they were unaware of the problem having any impact on government services.

We are certainly aware of the disruption this has caused to business and to those particiualrly looking to travel today. We are keeping in closely monitoring the situation and making sure the relevant industries can use the support we can provide.

12.39pm BST

Dollar set for weekly gain, stocks down amid IT outage

The dollar rose and stock markets fell in jittery trading today, as the global IT outage unnerved investors.

The group that runs the London Stock Exchange suffered an outage that affected user access to some of its products, and Refinitiv was down earlier. By around midday in Europe, the company said its services had been restored.

The pound, which earlier this week hit a one-year high above $1.30, fell by 0.2% today to $1.2921.

The FTSE 100 index in London lost 0.5% or 43 points to 8,161, while the German Dax and the French CAC traded down by a similar amount,, and the FTSE MiB in Milan slid by 0.7%.

The dollar index , which measures the US currency against six other major currencies, rose by 0.2% to a high of 104.4, and is set for a modest weekly gain after two weeks of losses.

12.28pm BST

Emergency Cobra meeting held at official level – Downing Street

An emergency Cobra meeting was held at official-level – rather than ministers – this morning to discuss the IT chaos, Downing Street said.

A No 10 spokeswoman told reporters:

We recognise the impact this is having on services and the Government is working closely with the respective sectors and industries on this issue, which is affecting services not only across the UK but also globally.

Officials have met in the Cobra unit on this this morning and of course are updating ministers regularly on this issue.

She said she was not aware of plans for a Cobra gathering with ministers present. Asked why Sir Keir Starmer did not chair the meeting of the committee, she said:

The Prime Minister’s had bilaterals with President Zelensky and Cabinet this morning, but all ministers including the Prime Minister are being kept informed with the latest.

The spokeswoman also said she is not aware of any government business being hit by the outage.

12.26pm BST

Staff at London Stansted Airport handed out bottles of water to people queuing on the hot July day, as a global IT outage caused delays.

Carol Murphy , 58, a charity worker, of Ealing in west London, who was queuing inside the terminal building for a Ryanair flight to go on a 10-day holiday to Vienna, said the situation was “nobody’s fault”.

They keep coming round and people who’ve got a flight upcoming, they send them forward.

I think they’re doing quite well.

Student Jack O’Leary , who was queuing for a Ryanair flight to Dublin to go on holiday, said:

We’re quite understanding - it’s a global outage and everything’s pretty chaotic.”

The 27-year-old, from near Cambridge, added:

We’re very much in stasis mode waiting for something to happen and hoping we can get to Dublin today.

12.24pm BST

Some US tourists were forced to pay 6,800 dollars (£5,262) for new flights home from Edinburgh Airport after original plans were cancelled because of IT outages.

Stephanie Thompson , heading home to Dallas, Texas, said her family, who were in the UK to attend Wimbledon and the Open Championship in Troon, were unable to reach British Airlines or American Airlines for support.

Speaking from Edinburgh Airport, she told the PA news agency:

It was supposed to leave at 9.25am and change in Heathrow at 11 and we were supposed to get into Dallas later today.

We couldn’t get an answer from anybody. British Airways kept hanging up saying we have too many calls right now. I was on hold with American (Airlines) for about an hour and 10 minutes before I finally hung up.

We just paid 6,800 dollars for a one-way trip home, hopefully leaving tonight. I didn’t know what else to do. I just wanted something to get us home.

Another US tourist, Debbie, and her family, said their flight to Boston was also cancelled.

12.17pm BST

Rafa de Miguel, El País’s UK correspondent, posted this video about “complete chaos at Ryanair bag drop at Stansted airport”.

12.05pm BST

Guardian readers have been getting in touch to tell us how their travel plans have been affected by this morning’s outage.

Saffy Saleem , 29, a doctor travelling to Mallorca on holiday, is waiting for her flight from Stansted Airport, where she describes the scene as “chaotic”. “We’re stuck at Ryanair check-in. There are queues everywhere,” she says.

She has been waiting at the gate for nearly an hour.

We only managed to get our boarding passes about an hour before the flight, but once they checked in then we made it through security. But there were loads of people who’d already missed their flights.

She has been given a handwritten boarding pass and luggage tags.

They’re manually checking people in by crossing out who’s in what seat, and then working out where the free seats are, because no one has seat allocations. It’s very old-school and slow.

In Budapest, George Burr , 71, who is returning from a holiday with his wife, is currently waiting on a Ryanair plane to Bristol. He says:

We didn’t find out about the outage by anybody telling us, but by looking at the Guardian newspaper online.

Similarly to Stansted, Burr says that airline staff had adapted check-in procedures on Friday morning:

At the check-in, they just had a single sheet of A4 paper, and were just making a note of people’s check-in numbers. It was all done manually.

We’ve been sitting on the plane for nearly two hours. The cabin crew have had to manually count everybody. Obviously they’re not used to counting us, so they had to do it three times.

We’ve been told we’re waiting for a slot to take off, but nothing’s happened yet. I don’t know what the position is at Bristol airport, whether there’d be issues about us landing or not. There’s no certainty, I guess.

Meanwhile in Verona, Emma O’Hara , 30, from Dublin has encountered long queues and delays on her return from holiday in Italy with her friend Aisling.

A man [member of airport staff] came and kind of explained the situation, said that it was a European-wide outage, and he was quick to say that it wasn’t just Verona airport.”

We’ve been waiting an hour, which I suppose it’s not horrendous in the grand scheme of things, but we don’t know when we’ll board. People are a bit fed up, but no one’s in terrible humour yet.

Updated at 12.06pm BST

12.01pm BST

Here’s a video showing the chaos at airports.

11.58am BST

Microsoft says 'underlying cause has been fixed' – Refinitiv

Microsoft headlines are popping up on Refinitiv, saying the underlying cause of the global outage has been fixed.

• Microsoft: underlying cause has been fixed
  

• Microsoft: aware of an issue with Windows 365 Cloud PCs caused by a recent update to CrowdStrike Falcon sensor software
  

• Microsoft: underlying cause has been fixed for Microsoft 365 apps, services

11.47am BST

Hospitals have been affected by the outage in countries including the UK, Germany and Israel, as reported earlier.

Two hospitals in the northern German cities of Lübeck and Kiel have cancelled elective operations scheduled for Friday, their operator said.

In the UK, BBC news health editor Hugh Pym reported:

Updated at 11.50am BST

11.46am BST

The South African bank Capitec has also been affected.

Due to an unexpected issue with an international service provider, we are currently experiencing nationwide service disruptions,

it said in an X post, adding that card payments and ATMs are not affected. In replies to users on X it said it was “working hard to resolve” the issues.

11.45am BST

Chinese airlines not affected by outage, says state media

China’s flag carrier Air China and other major airlines have not been affected by the global tech outage that disrupted operations in multiple industries on Friday due to the use of different systems, according to state media CGTN.

Meanwhile, Wizz Air said it has suspended its fees for airport check-in as its online systems are unavailable due to the IT outage. It said in a statement:

During the outage, free airport check-in is available. Therefore, we advise passengers to arrive at the airport at least three hours before their scheduled departure time to allow sufficient time for check-in, security control and airport-specific health and safety procedures.

We thank you for your understanding as we deal with the effects of the global IT systems outage. The Wizz Air team is doing everything possible to minimise disruption to our customers.

11.28am BST

The UK’s science, innovation and technology secretary, Peter Kyle, said government departments “are working seamlessly together to understand the nature of today’s outages and respond appropriately and swiftly”.

11.25am BST

In a statement this morning , Spain’s national airports authority, Aena, said “an information systems issue” could cause delays to flights.

Owing to an information systems issue, alterations are occurring in Aena’s systems and those of the Spanish airport network, which could bring delays. We’re working to resolve this as soon as possible. In the meantime, we’re operating systems manually.

By midday Madrid time, however, it said all Spain’s airports were operating and that flights were going ahead. Aena said:

Airports and airlines all over the world have been affected by the same incident.

Today’s programming is happening but with certain delays and some airlines are reprogramming their operations. Contingency programmes were activated early this morning and some manual processes were used to maintain operations.”

Both departures and arrivals are subject to delays which are decreasing - but there was no standstill at any point.

Updated at 11.59am BST

11.23am BST

The UK’s transport secretary Louise Haigh posted on X:

We are aware of IT failures impacting several transport operators and terminals today, and we’re working at pace with industry and across government on the issue. There are no known security issues at present.

11.22am BST

Some lines from Australia’s home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil:

The Australian government has conducted a National Coordination Mechanism meeting, which I joined earlier this evening. CrowdStrike attended the meeting and we can confirm there is no evidence that this is a cyber-security incident.

This is a technical issue, caused by a CrowdStrike update to its customers. They have issued a fix for this, allowing affected companies and organisations to reboot their systems without the problem. The company has informed us that most issues should be resolved through the fix they have provided, but given the size and nature of this incident it may take some time to resolve.

Governments are closely engaged at all levels, focused on bringing together the affected parties and ensuring government entities institute the fix as quickly as possible.

Updated at 11.51am BST

11.16am BST

Here is our main story on the global IT outage:

Related: IT outage: banks, airlines and media hit by issues linked to Windows PCs

Here is an explainer of what we know so far about.

Business and institutions around the world have been been knocked offline after an IT outage. In the UK, GP doctors’ surgeries have said they are unable to access patient records or book appointments. Sky News was off air for few hours but resumed broadcasting, while Britain’s biggest train company warned passengers to expect disruption because of “widespread IT issues”.

Around the world banks, supermarkets and other major institutions reported computer issues disrupting services, with some airlines warning of delays and some airports grounding flights.

Related: Windows global IT outage: what we know so far

If you’ve been affected by the outage, we’d like to hear from you.

Related: Tell us: how have you been affected by the outage linked to Windows pcs?

11.11am BST

Boss of cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike blames global IT outage on software update

CrowdStrike president George Kurtz said the problem was caused by a “defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts”.

He wrote on X :

CrowdStrike is actively working with customers impacted by a defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts. Mac and Linux hosts are not impacted. This is not a security incident or cyberattack. The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed.

We refer customers to the support portal for the latest updates and will continue to provide complete and continuous updates on our website. We further recommend organizations ensure they’re communicating with CrowdStrike representatives through official channels. Our team is fully mobilized to ensure the security and stability of CrowdStrike customers.

Updated at 11.18am BST

11.09am BST

Holidaymakers can't claim compensation from airline

UK and EU holidaymakers who have their flights delayed because of the IT outage are likely to find that they cannot claim compensation from their airline because the problem is out of its control, writes our consumer & Money editor Hilary Osborne .

EU rules, adopted by the UK , say that passengers can get compensation of up to £520 if their flight is cancelled or delayed by more than three hours - but not when the cause is an “extraordinary circumstance.”

Airlines are likely to argue that the outage counts as such - and some are already stressing in communications that the problems are not their fault.

Passengers who have travel insurance might be able to make a claim on their policy - but it will depend on the terms and conditions of the policy they have bought.

11.02am BST

Cabinet minister: Whitehall crisis officials coordinating outage response

Whitehall crisis officials are co-ordinating the response to the major IT outage, cabinet minister Pat McFadden has said.

In a post on X, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster said:

Cobra is the committee tasked with handling matters of national emergency or major disruption.

The UK government has been urged to convene a Cobra meeting to respond to the major IT outage hitting airlines, train companies and banks.

In the UK, train companies are reporting delays, GP surgeries are unable to book appointments or access patient records and Sky News was knocked off air but is now back on air. Restaurants in parliament appear to be affected too, with catering services only accepting cash payments.

The Liberal Democrats demanded ministers co-ordinate an urgent response. The party’s Cabinet Office spokesperson Christine Jardine said:

The government must call an urgent Cobra meeting to address the chaos being caused by these IT outages across the country. The public needs to be reassured that the disruption to their travel or their desperately needed GP appointments will be minimised.

Getting critical infrastructure up and running again must be priority number one. The National Cyber Security Centre should also be working with small businesses and other organisations to help them deal with the outage.

This once again lays bare the need to improve our digital infrastructure and truly modernise our economy in order to prevent the incidents from happening again.

10.54am BST

Some UK retailers forced to switch to 'cash only'

Some UK retailers have been forced to switch to cash only because of the global IT outage.

Waterstones in Falkirk said on X:

Waitrose and Morrisons are also affected, according to shoppers and other reports.

Wetherspoons cannot take card payments, according to social media reports.

10.47am BST

The Israeli health ministry said “the global malfunction,” has affected 16 hospitals across the country. Patients are not affected, they said, as the hospital has switched to using analogue or other systems without issue.

The ministry instructed the Israeli ambulance service, the Magen David Adom, to evacuate patients to hospital facilities unaffected by the malfunctioning computer systems. So far, they said ambulance services have not been affected by the issue, but advised anyone looking to call an ambulance to try an alternate number for the service if problems occur on the standard line.

In the Emirates, the Dubai International Airpor t, a major transit hub, said it has resumed normal operations after a system outage that had affected check-in procedures for some airlines, per Reuters.

One passenger with the Indian domestic airline IndiGo vented their frustrations on social media at being stuck in long queues at check in.

Stuck at Dubai airport for over an hour now. Check-in servers down, no movement in sight. Frustrating start to travel.

10.46am BST

Some children told to stay off school on last day of term

Some children have been told to stay off school on the last day of term.

Castleford Academy in west Yorkshire said it is closed today.

Whitecross Hereford High School in Herefordshire said its school information management system is down due to the tech outage and that parents should phone or email if their child is sick.

10.30am BST

NHS England: Outage causing disruption in most GP practices but no impact on 999

The IT outage is “causing disruption in the majority of GP practices” in
England but there is currently no known impact on 999 or emergency services, NHS
England said.

St Peter’s Medical Centre in Brighton, which uses SystmOne rather than Emis, is operating normally, my colleague Charlotte Naughton has pointed out.

Updated at 10.35am BST

10.24am BST

Birmingham Airport said the majority of flights are operating normally but passengers are facing some delays at check-in.

On X, formerly Twitter, the airport posted:

The majority of flights are operating as normal. However, some check ins are experiencing delays which are being processed by colleagues. For those that have checked in online previously are unaffected.

This is clearly a rapidly evolving situation. Customers should follow the advice from airlines and we will continue to update passengers throughout the day.

A spokeswoman for easyJet , the UK’s biggest airline by passenger numbers, advised customers travelling from Spanish airports to arrive three hours before their flight due to the IT outage. She said:

EasyJet’s IT systems have not been directly affected by the Microsoft systems issues this morning, however we are aware that some airports’ systems have been impacted across Europe.

This has led to some disruption to flights this morning and we expect some further potential impact to flights today.

Customers should expect longer than usual airport queues and we are advising customers travelling from Spanish airports to arrive three hours before their flight. We advise customers due to travel with us today to continue to check the latest updates on their flight on easyJet’s Flight Tracker before making their way to the airport. Although outside of our control, we are sorry for any inconvenience caused.

10.21am BST

Expert reaction to mass global IT outage

Here is more reaction from experts to the massive global IT outage:

Shumi Akhtar , associate professor at the University of Sydney, said:

Today’s technology outage — an unprecedented global crisis— sparked off in the USA, is now ominously rippling across the globe. This sudden, severe disruption halts everyday activities and starkly exposes the fragility of our heavily digitised world. From banking to healthcare, education to government, no sector remains untouched, highlighting an urgent need for a worldwide strategic overhaul of our critical infrastructures. This crisis calls for immediate collaborative action to enhance resilience through robust safeguards and fail-safes, especially in life-critical networks.

As a result of this outage, at least three critical sectors could be affected significantly.

In the medical industry , a technology outage can result in the loss of access to electronic medical records, critical patient data, and communication systems essential for patient care. This could delay surgeries, medication administration, and emergency responses, potentially endangering lives.

In the banking sector , an outage can cripple financial transactions, including ATM withdrawals, online banking, and payment processing. This disruption can lead to significant financial losses for consumers and institutions, and undermine public trust in the financial system

For the airline industry , technology outages can ground flights, disrupt ticketing and check-in processes, and affect air traffic control. This can lead to massive delays, financial losses, and compromise passenger safety and security. Each of these scenarios highlights the catastrophic potential of technology failures across critical industries.

Prof John McDermid of the Institute for Safe Autonomy at the University of York said:

Security software is intended to protect computers from attack, e.g. by malware. and to provide this protection it has a lot of power to control the host PC. Such software is pervasive – on many if not all machines of a particular type – so a fault in the security software can bring down many computers at once. This appears to be what is behind the widespread outage of Windows-10 based PCs around the world, with knock-on effects on air travel, banking, etc.

We need to be aware that such software can be a common cause of failure for multiple systems at the same time, and we need to design infrastructure to be resilient against such common cause problems, e.g. through use of diversity, that is not relying on a single make of computer system and/or software.

Dr Harjinder Lallie, cyber security expert at the University of Warwick, said:

The worldwide IT outage experienced this morning is unprecedented in the range and scale of systems it has impacted. Although we cannot speculate on the cause of this outage just yet, it appears that this might be a server error emanating from one server supplier.

This IT ‘catastrophe’ highlights the need for greater resilience, a greater focus on backup systems, and possibly even a need to rethink whether we are using the most resilient operating systems for such critical systems.

10.12am BST

A traveller at Gatwick Airport queuing for over three-and-a-half hours has described the scene at the travel hub as “bedlam” with staff now handing out water to those stranded, PA reported.

Dean Seddon started queuing at 6am to check in for a trip with his social media training company to Miami, Florida, ahead of their scheduled departure at 10am with Norse Atlantic Airways.

There are just people everywhere, there must be 400 people in this queue for the check in desk I’m at... it’s just bedlam,” the 42-year-old from Plymouth told the PA news agency.

It’s one of those things where you kind of know we’re not going to fly, but you don’t want to leave because you don’t know.

[Staff are] doing the best they can but they don’t actually know when it’s going to be fixed, so it is frustrating, but you kind of feel for the staff as well.

Seddon said there had been some people getting “agitated” in the queue but overall travellers had remained calm.

10.06am BST

UK pharmacies hit by IT outage

The UK’s National Pharmacy Association confirmed the IT outage is disrupting community pharmacies.

A spokesperson said:

We’re aware that due to global IT outages that services in community pharmacies, including the accessing of prescriptions from GPs and medicine deliveries, are disrupted today.

We urge patients to be patient whilst visiting their pharmacy. We’re urgently raising this issue with the NHS England.

10.05am BST

Ilkka Turunen , of the software supply chain management firm Sonatype, explains what’s going on with the Microsoft Windows outage.

The widespread outages across the world affecting Microsoft Windows are due to a botched update to a piece of software called CrowdStrike, a well-regarded malware and endpoint protection tool often used by enterprises and many companies across the world.

In terms of technical details, the update causes a BSOD loop on any Windows machine essentially making it boot and crash on an infinite loop. Making it worse is the fact that there are a significant number of Windows machines that the update was auto-installed on overnight. There are workarounds that customers of theirs will apply, but it seems to be very manual.

It’s definitely a supply chain style incident - what it shows is that one popular vendor botching an update can have a huge impact on its customers and how far a single well-orchestrated update can spread in a single night. It’s not yet clear if the contents were due to malicious reasons, but it shows how quickly targeted attacks on popular vendors could spread.

Updated at 11.52am BST

10.02am BST

Swiss International Air Lines is also affected.

The Hungarian low-cost carrier Wizz Air said it is “facing extreme technical challenges” and advised “customers to arrive at the airport at least 3 hours prior to their flight today.”

Updated at 10.08am BST

10.02am BST

Airports in Germany hit by outage at start of school holidays

Airports in Germany have also been hit by the outages, causing major delays at the start of school holidays for many regions.

Air traffic at Berlin’s BER came to a complete halt in the early morning hours of Friday, according to public broadcaster RBB due to a server breakdown that triggered several emergency systems to kick in.

The daily Tagesspiegel said several in-bound flights could not land in Berlin and had to return to the airport of origin or be redirected.

An airport spokesman said he expected takeoffs and landings to resume in the late morning.

A reporter for news agency DPA said long queues had formed at Terminal 1, particularly at check-in counters.

A spokeswoman for Hamburg’s international airport said that four carriers had been affected by outages: Eurowings, Ryanair, Vueling and Turkish Airlines, requiring tickets and boarding passes to be issued by hand.

The larger hubs of Frankfurt and Zurich reported no IT problems of their own but saw disruptions due to the knock-on effect from other facilities.

The Schleswig-Holstein university hospital in the north of the country cancelled all planned operations in Kiel and Lübeck due to the disruptions , according to a statement on its website.

9.53am BST

Mark Lloyd , business unit manager at IT services firm Axians UK, said:

IT outages are being reported across the world due to a rogue CrowdStrike update. So far the outage has affected airports, banks, railways and the media, with Sky News being left unable to broadcast [earlier] this morning.

This outage is a stark reminder of how dependent the world is on cloud services. From productivity tools to critical infrastructure, a large chunk of technology runs on cloud platforms. This outage showcases the immense power and reach these services hold.

Even the biggest tech giants are not immune to disruptions, and the need for robust redundancy and disaster recovery plans across the board are more critical than ever in this day and age.

It’s important to remember in a time of disruption like this, we’re all on the same team, fighting the same bad guys.

Updated at 11.52am BST

9.51am BST

At this stage, government officials are indicating they are not treating this as a cyber attack from hostile states or criminals , reports Dan Sabbagh, the Guardian’s defence and security editor.

9.48am BST

Cyber security expert says outage may be caused by 'bug to security update'

Cyber security expert Dan Card , from BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, said people “should remain calm” while businesses respond to the global IT outage, which may have been caused by a “bug to a regular security update”.

It looks like a bug to a regular security update, rather than any form of ‘mega cyber attack’, but this is still causing worldwide challenges and is likely to require a large number of people to take manual remedial steps.

Companies should make sure their IT teams are well supported as it could be a difficult and highly stressful weekend for them as they help customers.

People often forget the people that are running around fixing things.

9.46am BST

'World grinding to a halt' but stock markets functioning as normal

“The world grinding to a halt because of a global IT meltdown shows the dark side to technology and that relying on computers doesn’t always make life easier,” says Dan Coatsworth , investment analyst at the stockbroker AJ Bell.

Countless industries, from airlines and trains to banks and media, face disruption to earnings if they cannot do their job. Workers cannot get from A to B and that will have a knock-on effect for industries across the board if staff aren’t there to perform important functions or systems are offline.

The severity of the problem boils down to how long it lasts. A few hours’ disruption is unhelpful but not a catastrophe. Prolonged disruption is another matter, potentially causing damage to companies and economies.

There is chatter that cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike ran an update which didn’t work on Microsoft’s operating system and that caused systems to fall over. Given we don’t know the full details, it’s too early for investors to work out the financial or reputational impact to these businesses.

Stock markets continued to function as normal despite corporate news feeds and information terminals being impacted by the tech outage. Futures prices imply a small pullback when Wall Street opens later today, but so far investors have not shown any panic. Whether that remains the case as the day goes on is another matter.

Updated at 11.52am BST

9.37am BST

The global IT outage comes at a time when many people are heading off on their summer holidays.

The Dutch airline KLM said on X:

Eurowings , which is part of Germany’s Lufthansa group, said:

9.32am BST

Britain’s Sky News is back on air after an outage lasting several hours, but its presenter said the news channel was operating at minimal capacity and without many of its usual services.

Two presenters were reading from paper scripts, with one, Anna Jones, saying they were not yet able to connect to any guests outside the studio to conduct interviews.

9.20am BST

GP surgeries in England hit by outage

GP surgeries across England hit by the outage have said the issue “will have a big effect”.

GP practices said they are unable to access patient records or book appointments due to the major global IT outage. Surgeries took to social media to report they cannot access the EMIS Web system. It is understood that NHS hospitals are currently unaffected by the outage.

Central Lakes Medical Group in Ambleside wrote on X:

We’re impacted by the IT outage. This will have a big effect on us, so apologies in advance for the inconvenience caused, and delays on the phone.

Another post by Pocklington Group Practice in the East Riding of Yorkshire said:

Due to ongoing Windows issues affecting IT worldwide, the practice is currently unable to function as normal.

This may result in appointments needing to be cancelled and rearranged. Updates will follow when available.

The Wilmslow Health Centre in Cheshire wrote on X:

All practices in the UK using the NHS commissioned GP computer system EMIS are currently without access to their IT systems.
This is beyond the control of GP surgeries. Please bear with us until we have our IT systems back online.

The Church Lane Surgery in Brighouse, West Yorkshire, posted on X that “our clinical system has not been working since 7am this morning”. The GP practice said:

We have no access to patient clinical records so are unable to book appointments or provide information... This is a national problem and is being worked on as a high priority.

Solihull Healthcare Partnership in the West Midlands said there is a “national issue” with EMIS Web, the clinical computer system. Writing on X, it said:

Unfortunately there is a national issue with EMIS Web - our clinical computer system.
This will affect our ability to book/consult with patients this morning.
We will update patients when we can. We apologise for the disruption.

A reader wrote to us this morning, saying:

I’m currently sat in NHS Chorley Hospital (UK) and can confirm they are having issues and have been told they maybe cancelling appointments. I am an outpatient.

Updated at 9.28am BST

8.56am BST

Airports, airlines including Ryanair disrupted by outage

Edinburgh Airport said the IT outage is causing longer waiting times. A spokesperson said:

An IT system outage means wait times are longer than usual at the airport.
This outage is affecting many other businesses, including airports. Work is ongoing to resolve this and our teams are on hand to assist where we can. Passengers are thanked for their patience.

Ryanair said its flights are being disrupted by the outage. The airline said in a statement:

We’re currently experiencing disruption across the network due to a global third party IT outage which is out of our control.

We advise all passengers to arrive at the airport at least three hours before their scheduled departure time.

Turkish Airlines said “due to a global technical issue in our information systems, we are currently experiencing problems with ticketing, check-in, and reservation processes.”

Spain reported a “computer incident” at all its airports, while Amsterdam and Berlin’s Brandenburg airports are also affected.

Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport said “there is currently a global system failure. This disruption also has an impact on flights to and from Schiphol. The impact is now being mapped.”

Berlin’s Brandenburg airport said that “due to a technical fault, there will be delays in check-in.”

Airports in India have also been disrupted, according to a passenger.

Updated at 9.31am BST

8.48am BST

London Northwest Railway and West Midlands Railway said they are also affected by the outage.

8.20am BST

Banks, airlines, railways and media outlets hit by global outage linked to Windows PCs

Businesses including banks, airlines, railways, telecommunications companies, TV and radio broadcasters, and supermarkets have been taken offline after blue screen of death error screens were seen on Windows workstations across the globe.

Users on the subreddit for cyber security firm CrowdStrike reported issues in India, the United States and New Zealand.

Britain’s biggest train company has warned passengers to expect disruption due to “widespread IT issues”.

Govia Thameslink Railway – parent company of Southern, Thameslink, Gatwick Express and Great Northern – issued an alert on its social media channels.

The NHS booking system used by doctors in England is offline , medical officials said on X .

Sky News in the UK reported being off air this morning, with Sky News sports presenter Jacquie Beltrao posting on X: “We’re obviously not on air – we’re trying.” Sky News is still down, according to a message on its website.

The London Stock Exchange is also facing technical issues.

Related: Banks, airlines and media outlets hit by global outage linked to Windows PCs

Updated at 11.52am BST

8.15am BST

The government’s borrowing was just over £3bn above the Office for Budget Responsibility’s (OBR) forecast across the first three months of the financial year, totalling nearly £50bn.

Receipts are running slightly behind expectations, while spending has been higher.

The EY Item Club forecasting group, which uses the Treasury’s model, thinks higher debt servicing costs means there’s a good chance this underperformance will persist for the rest of the year. Further ahead, the outlook for the public finances depends on how the new government approaches fiscal policy.

Peter Arnold , EY UK chief economist, said:

The public finances data tends to be prone to revision, so the picture for the start of fiscal year 2024-2025 could look different in a few months’ time. But as things stand, the EY Item Club thinks this underperformance is likely to persist. The OBR’s assumptions for gilt yields and Bank Rate look too low, and this suggests debt servicing costs will prove to be higher than they expect. This is likely to mitigate the reduction in borrowing caused by a significant tightening in fiscal policy.

Looking further ahead, the EY Item Club awaits the new chancellor’s first budget with interest. Maintaining the net debt rule will mean that, in the absence of forecast revisions from the OBR, the new government will face a similar need to consolidate to their predecessors. It looks likely that the freeze on most tax allowances will be maintained for at least the next three fiscal years. However, it may prove challenging to turn existing spending totals into department-by-department plans, both in terms of current and capital spending.

8.06am BST

Lisa Hooker, PwC’s leader of industry for consumer markets, said shoppers were still reluctant to spend despite the fall in inflation to 2%, higher wage increases and lower social security contributions.

It appears that the cooler, wetter weather over spring and early summer, combined with longer term uncertainty in the period prior to the general election, has discouraged shoppers from both buying seasonal goods and making longer-term big ticket purchases.

7.57am BST

Retail sales fell by 0.1% in the second quarter from the first, contributing little to GDGP growth.

Rob Wood , chief UK economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said this keeps his forecast for GDP growth in the second quarter at 0.6%, while the Bank of England has forecast 0.5%, “as consumer spending on services fares better while output is supported by business-to-business spending too”. He said:

As the weather took a turn for the worse in June so did consumers’ spending. Rainfall was 24% below average in June, compared to 19.7% above in May, but June was much cooler than May relative to the seasonal average. The temperature in June averaged 0.2 degrees below the norm, whereas May was the warmest since at least 1884. That probably explained the drop in sales in June.

Retail sales have been enormously volatile this year, as they are bounced around by the weather and measurement problems. That enormous volatility can disguise the underlying trend. Retail volumes were not booming in May and neither are they collapsing now. Year-over-year retail sales volumes growth is steadily, if unspectacularly, trending up as consumers’ real income growth improves, they have to replace items like televisions and clothes, and goods inflation slows relative to services.

7.52am BST

Charlie Huggins , of the investment firm Wealth Club, said:

Retail sales volumes came in weaker than expected in June, following a stronger-than-expected May. This continues the volatility in monthly sales patterns seen since the turn of the year, with strange weather and economic caution playing a role.

Consumers weren’t exactly splashing the cash in June - sales in every category, excluding fuel, declined. But we should remember that May sales were especially strong. Sales volumes over the last 3 and 6 months are broadly flat and suggest the consumer is in reasonable health, but not exactly feeling flush.

The volatility in monthly retail sales is making it even more difficult than usual to read the economic tea leaves. June was not a great month for the sector. But inflation is moderating, wages are rising and the election is now done and dusted, providing much needed certainty. This means sales could easily bounce back over summer, especially if the weather Gods start being a little more kind.

Updated at 8.00am BST

7.31am BST

Introduction: Retail sales in Great Britain slump by 1.2%; government borrowing figure for June is lowest since 2019

Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of business, the financial markets and the world economy.

Retail sales in Great Britain slumped by 1.2% last month, with retailers blaming poor weather and cost of living pressures.

Retail sales volumes fell by 1.2% in June from May, following an increase of 2.9% in May, according to the Office for National Statistics. Economists had expected a smaller fall of 0.4%.

Sales fell across most sectors, and were down by 2.1% at non-food stores (department, clothing, household, and other non-food stores) while supermarkets and other food stores posted a 1.1% decline.

Grant Fitzner , the ONS chief economist, said department stores, clothing shops and furniture stores were the biggest contributors to the fall.

Retail sales fell back from May’s recent high point with falls across all main shop types, with the exception of petrol stations.

Retailer commentary suggested that both poor weather and economic conditions had an effect, as consumers showed caution with their spending.

Separate figures from the ONS showed the government borrowed £14.5bn in June, £3.2bn less than in June last year. It was the lowest June borrowing – the difference between public sector spending and income – since 2019.

Analysts had pencilled in borrowing of £12bn.

The interest payable on central government debt fell by £5.5bn to £7.4bn, largely because the interest payable on index-linked gilts (government bonds) rises and falls with the retail prices index, which has reduced sharply.

Updated at 7.49am BST