CrowdStrike’s Blue Screen of Death issue affected 8.5 million Windows devices, less than 1% of the total

Jul 22, 2024 11:58:00 AM

Due to an update distributed by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike on July 18, 2024, a Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) appeared on PCs worldwide using CrowdStrike products. The impact extended to public transportation, and some airlines began issuing flight tickets manually. However, while the impact was visible in many areas, according to Microsoft, only 8.5 million Windows devices were affected, which is less than 1% of all Windows devices.

Falcon Content Update Fix and Tips Center | CrowdStrike

https://www.crowdstrike.com/falcon-content-update-remediation-and-guidance-hub/

Helping Our Customers Survive CrowdStrike Outage – Official Microsoft Blog

https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2024/07/20/helping-our-customers-through-the-crowdstrike-outage/

On Friday, July 19, 2024 at 4:09 UTC (13:09 JST), a logical error occurred with a sensor configuration update for Windows systems released by CrowdStrike. As a result, affected systems experienced a BSOD.

The outage was particularly common on devices that were connected to the internet within 1 hour and 18 minutes of the update becoming available, were running Windows 7.11 or later, and were using the CrowdStrike Falcon sensor.

The time-lapse video below shows how the BSOD caused numerous flight cancellations and delays in the US.

A 12-hour time-lapse video shows air traffic for American Airlines, Delta and United after what was likely the worst computer outage in history and forced a nationwide shutdown for all three airlines. photo:twitter.com/wwcQeiEtVe

— Colin McCarthy (@US_Stormwatch) July 19, 2024

All information terminals at Sydney International Airport stopped working due to BSOD.

BSOD errors appearing on all flight displays at Sydney Airport. #microsoft #crowdstrike photo:twitter.com/ZL9QwGdi1a

— techAU (@techAU) July 19, 2024

Microsoft has worked closely with CrowdStrike to develop guidelines for safely recovering systems.

Microsoft explains that while software updates can cause issues, serious incidents like the one with CrowdStrike are rare.

The company also said 8.5 million devices were affected, which is less than 1% of all Windows devices. But the scale of the social and economic impact of this small percentage of devices shows how widely CrowdStrike is being used by companies that support many important services.

By the way, Southwest Airlines was not affected by the CrowdStrike problem because it used Windows 3.1 and Windows 95 on its systems.

Windows 3.1 Saves the Day in CrowdStrike Outage – Southwest Airlines Copes with Archaic OS | Tom’s Hardware
https://www.tomshardware.com/software/windows/windows-31-saves-the-day-during-crowdstrike-outage