Irish businesses have been hit by a major IT outage that grounded airlines, disrupted financial services and hit media groups globally.
The outage has been blamed on social media on an update to the CrowdStrike security software, causing an issue with Windows software. Microsoft was not immediately available for comment.
Daa warned passengers travelling through Dublin and Cork airports to allow extra time to get through the airport, with queues already forming.
Ryanair systems in Dublin and Cork airports have been impacted by the issues. Flights are taking off, but the travellers may be unable to check in online.
“We’re currently experiencing disruption across the network due to a global third party IT outage which is out of our control,” the company said. It asked passengers who have not already checked in online to do so at the airport on Friday, and warned passengers to arrive at least three hours before their flight’s scheduled departure.
Aer Lingus is not affected by the global outage, though there may be delays at airports, according to a spokesman for the airline.
“The global IT outage is not currently impacting Aer Lingus services with flights mainly operating as normal,” he said. “There may be some processing delays at airports so customers should allow extra time for check-in, security, immigration and boarding. Customers should check the Aer Lingus website and app for updates.”
Meanwhile, Transport for Ireland said its apps are down due to the outage.
These include the Leap card top-up app, and the TFI Live app, which displays live public transport times.
In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, TFI said: “We apologise for the inconvenience caused this morning to our customers unable to use our TFI Live and TFI Leap Top-up mobile apps. There is a global outage affecting multiple countries at the moment. We don’t have an estimated resolution time.”
Financial markets were also hit, with the London Stock Exchange saying it was unable to publish news earlier in the day.
The Euronext Dublin appeared to have escaped the problems. “We are aware of the current Microsoft outage,” it said. “It is not impacting trading across our venues, and we are closely monitoring the situation.”
Separately, a spokesman for Bank of Ireland said its services are operating as normal. “We continue to closely monitor the situation,” he said.
AIB and PTSB also reported no disruption to their services.
Elsewhere Sydney Airport said “a global technical outage” had impacted its operations. It told passengers to expect delays, although flights were departing and arriving as planned.
Berlin’s Brandenberg Airport said it has also been hit by “a technical fault”, and that passengers have been delayed checking in.
Aena, Spain’s main airports operator, said “operations are being carried out using manual systems” due to an “incident” in its IT system. “Disruptions are occurring in Aena’s systems and in Spain’s airports network, which could cause delays. We are working to resolve this as soon as possible,” it said. – Additional reporting: The Financial Times Limited 2024
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