Microsoft deploys engineers to fix outage affecting 8.5 million devices

US software giant Microsoft has deployed hundreds of engineers and experts with its customers to restore their services after an outage caused by its cyber security partner CrowdStrike, the company said in a blog.

According to Microsoft, 8.5 million devices across the world were impacted by the outage caused by an update from CrowdStrike on July 18.

"Deploying hundreds of Microsoft engineers and experts to work directly with customers to restore services," Microsoft said in a blog post on July 20.

The global outage impacted several points of sales and even grounded airlines in India.

The outage put operations of businesses and systems across the globe in a state of limbo.

Airport and airline operations faced significant disruptions due to the outage, with airlines issuing advisories to passengers. IndiGo, SpiceJet and Akasa saw disruptions in their online check-in and boarding processes across their networks, forcing them to switch to manual mode.

Several users reported disruptions on the outage-tracking website Downdetector, and many took to X (now Twitter) to vent their frustration on the 'Blue Screen of Death' error messages.

Microsoft said that it is collaborating with other cloud providers and stakeholders, including Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and Amazon Web Services (AWS), to share awareness on the state of impact that it is seeing across the industry and inform ongoing conversations with CrowdStrike and customers.

"We recognise the disruption this problem has caused for businesses and in the daily routines of many individuals. Our focus is providing customers with technical guidance and support to safely bring disrupted systems back online," the blog said.

The software giant said the incident demonstrates the interconnected nature of a broad technology ecosystem comprising global cloud providers, software platforms, security vendors and other software vendors, and customers.

"It's also a reminder of how important it is for all of us across the tech ecosystem to prioritise operating with safe deployment and disaster recovery using the mechanisms that exist," Microsoft said.

The software major said that while software updates may occasionally cause disturbances, significant incidents like the CrowdStrike event are infrequent.