The ‘blue screen of death’ may be gone for now – but it’s “inevitable” there will be another IT outage, according to a tech expert.
Around the world yesterday, IT systems using Microsoft and global cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike were shut down due to a faulty update.
The outage affected banking, healthcare systems and airports – with many people reverting to the ‘dark ages’ paper use.
CrowdStrike Chief Executive George Kurtz said in a statement on X yesterday the issue has been identified and a “fix has been deployed”.
This fix, however, won’t be able to stop the knock-on effects of a worldwide IT outage – and the implications for the future.
Technology journalist Emmet Ryan said he would be “surprised” if a similar tech crisis didn’t happen again soon.
“While the EU is doing great work in terms of promoting the regulations... there still isn’t enough impetus at the large corporate level,” he told The Anton Savage Show.
“There isn't a system that isn't capable of failing – if Microsoft can fail anything can fail to be honest.”
He noted a cyberattack is more threatening – but an error like yesterday’s can be harder to solve.
“When it's an error as we're seeing it's taking a lot longer than usual to fix,” he said.
Everywhere you look: blue screens of death pic.twitter.com/Jh1fdVflTD
— Morning Brew ☕️ (@MorningBrew) July 19, 2024
Mr Ryan said yesterday’s outage could have been avoided through ‘redundancies and backups’ - systems designed to kick-in when something goes wrong.
“You don’t have a car without insurance,” he said. “Because you’re not going to crash it most of the time but there could be a chance you’ll crash it.
Risks to Microsoft
Tech experts have been calling on the introduction of backup systems “for years”, according to Mr Ryan – but companies like Microsoft and CrowdStrike still haven’t caught on.
“Until this focus on redundancies and backups is pushed, it’s inevitable that we're going to have another issue like this.”
The EU is currently developing regulations to increase cybersecurity – but it will need provisions for backups to prevent another crisis.
Yesterday’s outage cost Microsoft and CrowdStrike a “combined €80 billion”, according to Mr Ryan.
The chaos also introduced more people to the ‘blue screen of death’ - the error page that appears when Microsoft is unable to function.
