Indian airlines, airports and some brokerages affected by global IT outage (updated)

5Paisa Capital

19/07/2024 12:42

(Updates with comments from India IT minister, details)
    By Jayshree  P Upadhyay and Jaspreet Kalra
       MUMBAI, July 19 (Reuters) - Several Indian airlines and
airports and traders at some brokerages said they faced
technical and operational disruptions on Friday amid a global IT
outage.
    India's minister for information technology in a post on X
said the ministry was in touch with Microsoft and its associates
regarding the global outage. 
    An update to a product offered by global cybersecurity firm
CrowdStrike  CRWD.O  appeared to be the trigger, affecting
customers using Microsoft's  MSFT.O  Windows Operating System.
Microsoft said later on Friday the issue had been fixed.
    "The reason for this outage has been identified and updates
have been released to resolve the issue," India's minister for
information technology Ashwini Vaishnaw said.
    "We are currently experiencing technical challenges with our
service provider, affecting online services including booking,
check-in, and manage booking functionalities," Indian airline
SpiceJet  SPJT.BO  said on social media platform X.
    Indigo, Akasa Air, Vistara, Air India and Air India Express
also posted messages on X saying they were facing issues. 
    New Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai and Mumbai airports said they
too faced some IT issues and some services were temporarily
affected. 
    While India's brokerage firms faced technical issues, stock
exchanges were not impacted. NSE and BSE said that their
operations were running normally.  
        Among the brokerages in India, Nuvama Wealth Management
 NUVA.NS , Edelweiss Mutual Fund, Motilal Oswal, IIFL Securities
 IIFS.NS , 5Paisa Capital  PAIS.NS  and Angel Broking are facing
technical difficulties, traders at the brokerages told Reuters.
    Edelweiss Mutual Fund posted on X that its systems were
facing login issues which it was working to resolve. Nuvama in a
statement to Reuters said it had seen a limited impact due to
the global outage.  
    Other brokerage firms did not immediately respond to
requests for comment.
    India's interbank trading platforms were functioning,
however, and banks said they were able to execute bonds and
foreign exchange transactions without any issues. 
    Banking sources said that the major banks have not faced any
technical issues. 
    A source at the country's central bank said they were aware
of the global outage but their systems were functional. 
    Major U.S. airlines also issued ground stops citing
communications issues while some other airlines, banks, media
and hospitals around the world were also among those affected by
the outage. 
    CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz said on X that the company was
"actively working with customers impacted by a defect found in a
single content update for Windows hosts" and that a fix was
being deployed.
    "This is not a security incident or cyberattack," Kurtz said
in the post.

 (Reporting by Jayshree P Upadhyay and Jaspreet Kalra; Writing
by Swati Bhat; Editing by Tom Hogue and Susan Fenton)
 ((swati.bhat@thomsonreuters.com; twitter.com/swatibhat22;
Reuters Messaging: swati.bhat.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))