Microsoft outage brings essential services the world over to a standstill, India too affected

New Delhi [India], July 19 : To a large extent, flight operations, banking services, financial services, and hospitals, among other key services, are disrupted globally due to an outage in Microsoft's cloud services. And India is not an exception.
In India, the services that were most disrupted were flight operations. Virtually all airline operators had to either cancel or reschedule the flights, causing inconvenience to millions of flyers.
Passengers at different airports have shared their experiences on social media, posting images of handwritten boarding passes issued due to the disruption. Indigo's flight cancellation list earlier today showed about 190 flights have been cancelled from 15:50 IST today to 05:20 IST Saturday. Here is the link to check the flights that were cancelled: [Indigo Flight Cancellations] (https://www.goindigo.in/information/flight-cancellations.html).
Suvojit Mukherjee, a passenger at Deoghar Airport in Jharkhand, posted on X, "Today's Microsoft / CrowdStrike outage has grounded most airports in India. Received my first handwritten boarding pass today. A stark reminder of the risks of digital dependency," along with a photo of his manual ticket.
"Handwritten Boarding pass as worldwide Microsoft outage today!! Airlines reporting issues across airports and countries," Rachit, another flyer at Biju Patnaik Airport in Bhubaneswar posted on X.
Union Minister of Civil Aviation Rammohan Naidu assured travellers that his Ministry and the Airports Authority of India (AAI) are managing the situation with manual methods to minimize disruption.
Minister Naidu stated, "I have directed airport authorities and airlines to be compassionate and provide extra seating, water, and food for passengers affected by delays. We understand your concerns and are working tirelessly to ensure your safe and swift travel. Your patience and cooperation are greatly appreciated."
Passengers are advised to cooperate with airport staff during this period of disruption.
After Microsoft reported a disruption in certain cloud services, the central government said it is in touch with Microsoft and its associates regarding the global outage.
The Reserve Bank of India has asserted that its assessment showed that only 10 banks and NBFCs had minor disruptions due to the Microsoft outage. The disruptions reported in those entities have "either been resolved or are being resolved".
Hospitals in India also reported that their systems across the network were impacted by the ongoing outage in Microsoft cloud services.
"We are aware of the recent global CrowdStrike outage that resulted in BSOD on MS Windows for many subscribers. At Fortis, we experienced a brief interruption in our diagnostic services, which was managed efficiently. Our systems continue to run normally, and we have conducted thorough checks to verify this," Fortis Healthcare said in a brief statement.
"Due to an Microsoft outage our systems were impacted from 11 am onwards till 3.30 pm today. Many of our software applications used for patient care and other processes were impacted. We had to switch to manual processes to service our patients as an alternative mechanism. We have resumed regular operations," a Gangaram Hospital spokesperson said.
CrowdStrike, the security firm linked to a software update that caused the outage, said that the issue has been isolated and a fix deployed.
George Kurtz, President and CEO of CrowdStrike said the cybersecurity company was working with customers on the issues faced by them while giving a reassurance that the issue was "not a security incident or cyberattack."
At the time of filing this report, the outage is still in place in varying degrees, and the exact time by when it will be fully resolved is yet not stated by Microsoft.
"This development highlights how it is a misnomer that enhanced technology deployment alone will help organisations become more secure and ensure business continuity. While organisations work towards remediation of the current situation, the focus should be on rethinking risks and moving beyond the layers, patches, products and tools to building an inherently strong cyber architecture with complementary interventions that ensure resilience in the face of such unforeseen technology setbacks or failures," Sundareshwar K, Partner and Leader-Cybersecurity, PwC India, said in a note.