What we know about Microsoft and CrowdStrike’s global outage

Some computers that were not turned on during the software update appear to have avoided the problem, according to initial reports.

What caused this?

Cybersecurity programs like CrowdStrike update frequently and automatically to account for new tactics that malicious hackers have discovered. And there is always a small risk that any software update will be incompatible with other programs.

The CrowdStrike update should have been routine, but a bug in its code conflicted with Windows and proved catastrophic.

The company’s CEO, George Kurtzsaid Friday morning on the “TODAY” show that while some customers would see their computers repaired automatically, others would require manual labor to fix them.

“The system received an update, and that update contained a software bug and caused a problem with the Microsoft operating system,” Kurtz said. “Our systems are always looking for the latest attacks from these adversaries out there.”

How long until things go back to normal?

CrowdStrike identified the issue and issued a fix on Friday after the issue began to surface.

The fix required affected computers to download another software update, which some were able to do automatically.

Many businesses and services affected by the chaos, such as the New Hampshire Department of Safety, which said its 911 system was briefly offline, reported they were back online Friday morning.

Others were unable to load the update, which would require IT employees at some companies to restart and tinker with each affected computer.

“A lot of the customers are rebooting the system, and it’s coming, and it’s going to be operational because we fixed it,” Kurtz said. “We are working with some of the systems that are not recovering. Therefore, it may take some time for some systems that simply will not recover automatically.”