Problems arose with the program update of Crowdstrike Holdings Inc., affecting 8.5 million devices worldwide operating on the Microsoft Windows operating system. Microsoft Corp. representatives confirmed that the impacted devices represented less than 1% of all Windows users, but the repercussions were significant, as stated in a Microsoft blog post.
An incorrect update resulted in a global system failure at businesses and government institutions, leading to a halt in operations for several hours. Emergency communication channels were disrupted, causing delays and cancellations of thousands of flights, procedures postponed at hospitals, and a slowdown in financial markets.
The CROWDSTRIKE update caused a blue screen of death on Windows devices, triggering an endless reboot cycle rendering them unusable. The issue was linked to a configuration file modification that caused a logical error, crashing the operating system. Although Crowdstrike released a fix, devices trapped in the reboot cycle were unable to connect to the Internet to download the update. The solution required manually deleting the problematic file in safe mode or Windows recovery mode, with multiple Windows reboots potentially assisting up to 15 times.
Following the incident, CROWDSTRIKE shares experienced a significant drop in price, leading to substantial financial losses for the company. Despite this setback, in 2024, the company engaged in various significant transactions and maintained active collaborations with government agencies.