MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Computer glitch paralyzes key services globally

Airlines and banks globally were rendered inoperational due to the malfunction

A Microsoft computer system crashed worldwide Friday as the so-called “blue screen of death” appeared on many users after the cybersecurity company CrowdStrike used a faulty software update hitting servers and cloud storage services causing severe losses and distress.

CrowdStrike has been implementing contingency measures as services gradually go back to normal. The company named after its antivirus system acknowledged the problem in the wee hours of Friday, New York time. The glitch originated in the United States and spread globally.

“The origin of the problem is generated by an update of a cybersecurity component of Crowdstrike, which has caused problems in its interaction with Microsoft platforms,” the company admitted. This component would be the so-called CrowdStrike Falcon agent, a piece of software deeply embedded in the world's computing infrastructure to allegedly protect Windows computers from cyberattacks, for which it is regularly granted access to a deep set of permissions.

These blue screens of death (BSOD) only exist on Microsoft's Windows and pop up whenever it is unable to recover from a system failure. They were created back in 1985 for Windows 1.0. They usually come along with an error code that can help solve the problem.

Among the critical services affected were 911 emergency lines in many US locations. Most major airlines had to ground flights.