Microsoft cites configuration change in a portion of its Azure backend workloads as the primary reason

Connectivity down

• Microsoft Windows down due to security update
• ‘Blue Screen of Death’ error forces shutdowns
• IT Ministry rates disruption as critical

New Delhi: The global outage of the US tech giant Microsoft has affected millions of users across the world, including in India, where airlines and airport services are majorly hit.

Millions of Microsoft Windows users experienced the “Blue Screen of Death” error that caused their computers to shut down or restart.

The company said it is due to a recent update of American cyber security company Crowdstrike. It cited a “configuration change in a portion of its Azure backend workloads” as the primary reason.

The outage led to an interruption between storage and compute resources which resulted in connectivity failures that affected downstream Microsoft 365 services dependent on these connections, the company noted.

Microsoft 365 posted on social media platform X that the company was “working on rerouting the impacted traffic to alternate systems to alleviate impact” and that they were “observing a positive trend in service availability.”

In India, operations of major airlines like Indigo, Vistara, Akasa, Spicejet, and Air India ops, as well as airport services were affected, and the Bengaluru Airport issued an advisory for travellers. Delhi Airport services were also “temporarily impacted”. In Hyderabad, Rajiv Gandhi International Airport cancelled 35 flights.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said there were minor disruptions of services at 10 banks and efforts were on to resolve all the issues.

Meanwhile, Union IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said his ministry was in touch with Microsoft regarding global outage, adding that NIC network was not affected.

In a post on X, IT Minister Vaishnaw said that the reason for this outage were identified and updates were released to resolve the issue. CERT is issuing a technical advisory, he wrote. CERT-In, in its advisory, rated the outage’s severity as ‘critical’. The advisory came amid a massive outage faced by Microsoft users globally, and widespread disruptions in international airlines, banks and media outlets.

Meanwhile, netizens celebrated the outage by sharing various humorous posts and memes on social media X.com and thanked the tech giant for an early weekend. “Thank you @MicrosoftIndia for letting us feel an early weekend. Kudos,” said a user.

“Thank you @MicrosoftIndia for providing an unofficial holiday today...!” added another. One user also “begged” Microsoft “to not fix the bluescreen for the next eight hours”.