Global IT Outage Disrupts Indian Airlines, Airports, and Brokerages

Several Indian airlines, airports, and brokerages faced technical and operational disruptions on Friday due to a global IT outage. The incident was linked to an update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike affecting Microsoft Windows users. Operations across major airlines, airports, and brokerages were temporarily impacted but later resolved.

Several Indian airlines, airports, and traders at various brokerages experienced technical and operational disruptions on Friday, owing to a global IT outage. India's minister for information technology announced that the ministry was in close contact with Microsoft and its partners to address the issue.

The disruption stemmed from an update by global cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, which affected customers using Microsoft's Windows Operating System. Microsoft stated the problem had been resolved by Friday. India's IT minister, Ashwini Vaishnaw, confirmed the cause and the resolution of the issue.

Indian airlines such as SpiceJet, Indigo, Akasa Air, Vistara, Air India, and Air India Express reported issues on social media platform X. Airports in New Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai, and Mumbai also faced temporary IT disruptions. Despite the challenges faced by India's brokerage firms, stock exchanges NSE and BSE remained unaffected.

Brokerages including Nuvama Wealth Management, Edelweiss Mutual Fund, Motilal Oswal, IIFL Securities, 5Paisa Capital, and Angel Broking reported technical difficulties. However, India's interbank trading platforms and major banks functioned normally. Globally, airlines, banks, media, and hospitals were among those impacted by the outage.

CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz clarified that the incident was not a security breach but a defect in a single content update for Windows hosts, which was being fixed.

(With inputs from agencies.)