Quicksplained: What is CrowdStrike? How is it linked to Microsoft's global IT outage?

You may have seen the “Blue Screen of Death” on your PC or laptop today – forcing it to shut down or restart.

You’re not alone.

Microsoft users across the world including the US, UK, India, Australia and Germany are facing this issue.

Companies have said that this is due to a CrowdStrike update.

But what it is? How is it linked to the global IT outage?

Let’s take a closer look:

• CrowdStrike is a cybersecurity software firm that provides advances security to users and businesses.

• As per BBC, the company was founded in 2011 by George Kurtz and Dmitri Alperovitch. Based in Texas, it has around 8,500 employees. It listed its shares on the Nasdaq stock exchange in 2019.

• As per India Today, the company’s software comes integrated with Windows. The company deploys cloud-based AI and machine learning to find and stop threats in real time.

• The firm in a support note stated, “Our Engineering teams are actively working to resolve this issue and there is no need to open a support ticket.”

• According to an alert sent by Crowdstrike to its clients and reviewed by Reuters, the company’s “Falcon Sensor” software is causing Microsoft Windows to crash and display a blue screen, known informally as the “Blue Screen of Death”.

• IT security firm also ran a recorded phone message on Friday saying it was aware of reports of crashes on Microsoft’s Windows operating system relating to its Falcon sensor.

• “Thanks for contacting Crowdstrike support. Crowdstrike is aware of reports of crashes on Windows … related to the Falcon sensor,” a prerecorded message stated.

• The outages rippled far and wide.

• The travel industry was among the hardest hit with airports around the world, including Tokyo, Amsterdam, Berlin and several Spanish airports reporting problems with their systems and delays. As per BBC, London’s Stansted and Gatwick, Amsterdam’s Schiphol and Delhi airport have all been impacted.

• International airlines, including Ryanair, Europe’s largest airline by passenger numbers, warned of problems with their booking systems and other disruptions. In the US, United, Delta and American Airlines have been forced to ground their flights, as per BBC.

• In Britain, booking systems used by doctors were offline, multiple reports from medical officials on X said, while Sky News, one of the country’s major news broadcasters was off air, apologising for being unable to transmit live.

• Banks and other financial institutions from Australia to India and South Africa warned clients about disruptions to their services, while LSEG Group reported an outage of its data and news platform Workspace.

• The company has said that the issue believed to be behind the outage was not a security incident or cyberattack.

• Amazon’s AWS cloud service provider said in a statement that it was “investigating reports of connectivity issues to Windows EC2 instances and Workspaces within AWS." It later came to light that AWS services were not impacted by the outage and continued to “operate normally”.

• The issue affected Microsoft 365 apps and services, and escalating disruptions continued hours after the technology company said it was gradually fixing it.

• CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz posted on social media platform X that the company “is actively working with customers impacted by a defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts.” He added: “This is not a security incident or cyberattack. The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed.”

• CrowdStrike was also mentioned in the infamous July 2019 phone call between then president Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump during the phone call brought up a long-discredited conspiracy theory that has attempted to cast doubt on Russia’s role in the 2016 hacking of the Democratic National Committee.

• CrowdStrike, a security firm hired by the DNC that detected, stopped and analysed the hack five months before the 2016 election.

• “I would like to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say CrowdStrike . I guess you have one of your wealthy people . The server, they say Ukraine has it.” Trump told Zelenskyy. He added that he would like to have then attorney general William Barr call “you or your people and I would like you to get to the bottom of it.”

• The firm found in June 2017 that Russian agents had broken into the committee’s network and stolen emails that were subsequently published by WikiLeaks. Its findings were confirmed by FBI investigators, with whom it later shared the forensic evidence.

• One version of the conspiracy theory claims that CrowdStrike is owned by a wealthy Ukrainian. In fact, company co-founder Alperovitch is a Russian-born US citizen who immigrated as a child and graduated from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

• Crowdstrike previously investigated the Sony Pictures hack in 2014. Ironically, the company has also worked for the GOP. It helped the National Republican Congressional Committee investigate email thefts by unidentified hackers during the 2018 campaign.

• This isn’t the first time Trump referred to the company. In an April 2017 interview with The Associated Press, Trump said: “Why wouldn’t (former Hillary Clinton campaign chairman John) Podesta and Hillary Clinton allow the FBI to see the server? They brought in another company that I hear is Ukrainian-based.”

• “CrowdStrike?” the interviewer asked. “That’s what I heard,” Trump replied. “I heard it’s owned by a very rich Ukrainian, that’s what I heard. But they brought in another company to investigate the server. Why didn’t they allow the FBI in to investigate the server? I mean, there is so many things that nobody writes about. It’s incredible.”

With inputs from agencies