Widespread technology outage disrupts hundreds of flights at Denver airport, law enforcement systems

FRANKFURT, Germany — A global technology outage grounded flights, knocked banks and hospital systems offline and media outlets off air on Friday in a massive disruption that affected companies and services around the world and highlighted dependence on software from a handful of providers.

Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike said that the issue believed to be behind the outage was not a security incident or cyberattack — and that a fix was on the way. The company said the problem occurred when it deployed a faulty update to computers running Microsoft Windows.

But hours after the problem was first detected, the disarray continued — and escalated.

Long lines formed at airports in the U.S., Europe and Asia as airlines lost access to check-in and booking services at a time when many travelers are heading away on summer vacations. News outlets in Australia — where telecommunications were severely affected — were pushed off air for hours. Hospitals and doctor’s offices had problems with their appointment systems, while banks in South Africa and New Zealand reported outages to their payment system or websites and apps.

As of 9:40 a.m. Friday, 334 flights were delayed and 89 were cancelled at Denver International Airport, according to tracker FlightAware.

Operations at the airport were “largely stabilized” and airline ground stops were lifted, the airport said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, about 7:45 a.m.

The airport advised travelers check their airline before traveling to the airport, as delays were still occurring.

IT teams across the state scrambled Friday morning as the outage affected many cities, including law enforcement systems.

Colorado Springs Police Department said the computer system failure began about 10:30 p.m. Thursday. Officers are continuing to respond to in-progress crimes and life-threatening emergencies, but the department urged drivers involved in accidents where there were no injuries or property damage to report the accident online within 72 hours. 

“At this time CSPD and City I.T. resources are working to address the issue,” the department said in a social media post Friday morning.

Colorado State Patrol said the outage impacted the agency’s computer aided dispatching system, but that staff created manual workarounds to administrative processes.

The city of Boulder said while emergency systems are operating, many of the city’s computers are down, according to a 9:30 a.m. post on social media. 

“City technical staff are working as quickly as possible to reset the impacted computers, but this must be done manually,” city officials said in the post, adding that utility billing and permits will be unavailable until further notice. 

At Hong Kong’s airport, Yvonne Lee, 24, said she only found out her flight to Phuket in Thailand was postponed to Saturday when she arrived at the airport, saying the way it was handled would “affect the image of Hong Kong’s airport very much.”

Her already short five-day trip would now have to be further shortened, she said.

Some athletes and spectators descending on Paris ahead of the Olympics were delayed as was the arrival of their uniforms and accreditations, but Games organizers said disruptions were limited and didn’t affect ticketing or the torch relay.

A disturbing reminder of vulnerability

“This is a very, very uncomfortable illustration of the fragility of the world’s core internet infrastructure,” said Ciaran Martin, a professor at Oxford University’s Blavatnik School of Government and former Head of Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre.

DownDectector, which tracks user-reported disruptions to internet services, recorded that airlines, payment platforms and online shopping websites across the world were affected — although the disruption appeared piecemeal and was apparently related to whether the companies used Microsoft cloud-based services.

Cyber expert James Bore said real harm would be caused by the outage because systems we’ve come to rely on at critical times are not going to be available. Hospitals, for example, will struggle to sort out appointments and those who need care may not get it.