A faulty update from cybersecurity vendor CrowdStrike caused a global outage last Friday, apparently affecting some 8.5 million Windows devices, according to Microsoft itself.
The update triggered a Blue Screen of Death (BSOD), which took systems used by hospitals, airlines and banks offline. Only machines running Windows were affected: according to CrowdStrike, the total number of affected devices was “less than one percent of all Windows machines.”
According to CrowdStrike, the update “was designed to target new malicious pipelines that have been observed being used in cyberattacks by common C2 frameworks.” Unfortunately, it included a logic bug that crashed the operating system. In Saturday’s blog post, Microsoft’s vice president of enterprise and OS security, David Weston, wrote that the company is working with CrowdStrike to “develop a scalable solution” to patch the flawed update. Microsoft has also asked amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Cloud Platform (GCP) for help.
Unfortunately, not everything is settled yet – just ask Delta passengers over the weekend.
—Mat Smith
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