Television channels, airports, and banks across the world have been thrown into chaos by a colossal IT outage, forcing Microsoft Windows computers to crash without warning. It looks like Crowdstrike, a piece of antivirus software is the cause of the problem, prompting all kinds of industries around the globe to shut down…

Services affected so far:

• Airlines: Flights have been grounded, with American Airlines, United, Delta, Ryanair and IndiGo amongst those affected.
• Trains: Thameslink, Southern Rail, Gatwick Express, Great Northern and Merseyrail are facing widespread delays.
• News Outlets: Sky News wasn’t able to broadcast this morning, displaying an apology message to viewers.
• Supermarkets and Pubs: Customers in the UK have complained about self-checkouts, while Wetherspoons has confirmed they’re having issues with their app used to order food and drinks.
• NHS: GP practices are reporting major disruptions.
• Financial Institutions and Banks: The London Stock Exchange (LSE) has warned its data feed is currently facing technical issues, while banks across Australia have also been hit.

The outage has also hit Parliament. A UK Parliament spokesperson said:

“Due to technical issues, tills in all outlets across the estate are not accepting card payments. Customers are able to pay using cash. Engineers are currently assessing any wider impacts following the global IT outages, but parliamentary business remains unaffected at this time.”

Smells like a hack… 

UPDATE: CrowdStrike said the global IT outage was “not a security incident or cyberattack”, adding: “The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed”.