A significant technical issue at US tech giant Microsoft and cybersecurity company CrowdStrike caused widespread disruptions today, impacting various sectors globally, including India.
Millions of Microsoft Windows users encountered the infamous "Blue Screen of Death" error, leading to unexpected shutdowns or restarts of their computers.
Microsoft identified the preliminary root cause as a "configuration change" in part of its Azure backend workloads. This change disrupted the connection between storage and compute resources, causing connectivity failures that affected downstream Microsoft 365 services reliant on these connections.
"Our services are still seeing continuous improvements while we continue to take mitigation actions," Microsoft said in a post on X (formerly Twitter).
Services affected in India
Airlines
Several airlines in India reported system disruptions due to the Microsoft outage.
Air India stated that its "digital systems have been impacted temporarily," leading to delays. Indigo also issued an advisory, mentioning increased wait times at contact centers and airports due to the Azure issue. Akasa Air and SpiceJet reported similar disruptions, with Akasa Air mentioning temporary unavailability of online services such as booking and check-in, and SpiceJet acknowledging technical issues in providing updates on flight disruptions.
Microsoft apps
Users faced difficulties accessing various Microsoft applications and services, including Microsoft 365, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft Azure.
Other apps
According to the outage tracking website Downdetector, users also experienced issues with other popular apps and services such as Instagram, Amazon, Gmail, and major Indian banks including the State Bank of India, ICICI Bank, Bank of India, and HDFC Bank.
The outage has drawn attention to the widespread reliance on Microsoft's infrastructure and the significant impact such technical issues can have across different sectors and services.