Microsoft-linked IT outage disrupts flights, media and banking worldwide

(Reuters) -- A global tech outage was disrupting operations in multiple industries on Friday, with airlines halting flights, some broadcasters off-air and everything from banking to health care hit by system problems.

U.S. carriers American Airlines, Delta Airlines, United Airlines and Allegiant Air grounded flights citing communication problems. The order came shortly after Microsoft said it had resolved its cloud services outage that had impacted several low-cost carriers, though it was not immediately clear whether those were related.

"A third party software outage is impacting computer systems worldwide, including at United. While we work to restore those systems, we are holding all aircraft at their departure airports," United said in a statement. "Flights already airborne are continuing to their destinations."

Australia's government said outages suffered by media, banks and telecoms companies there appeared to be linked to an issue at global cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike.

According to an alert sent by Crowdstrike to its clients and reviewed by Reuters, the company's "Falcon Sensor" software is causing Microsoft Windows to crash and display a blue screen, known informally as the "Blue Screen of Death".

The alert, which was sent at 0530 GMT on Friday, also shared a manual workaround to rectify the issue.

A Crowdstrike spokesperson did not respond to emails or calls requesting comment.

There was no information to suggest the outage was a cyber security incident, the office of Australia's National Cyber Security Coordinator Michelle McGuinness said in a post on X.

The outages rippled far and wide.

The travel industry was among the hardest hit with airports around the world, including Tokyo, Amsterdam, Berlin and several