Mass IT outage grounds planes as businesses around the world affected

Global IT issues are causing chaos around the world this morning with businesses including banks, airlines, telecommunications companies, TV and radio broadcasters and supermarkets all affected.

The outage appears to be affecting Windows PCs globally.

Overnight, Microsoft confirmed it was investigating an issue with its services and apps, with the tech giant’s service health website warning of “service degradation” that meant users may not be able to access many of the company’s most popular services, used by millions of business and people around the world.

Sky News was one of the channels affected in the UK and was off air for large parts of this morning.

GP appointments affected

GP surgeries have said they are unable to access patient records or book appointments due to the major global IT outage.

NHS England has been contacted for comment after practices across England took to social media to report they cannot access the EMIS Web system.

It is understood that NHS hospitals are currently unaffected by the outage.

EMIS Web is the most widely used clinical system for primary care in the UK.

It enables GP practices to book appointments, examine records and includes a clinical decision support tool as well as helping with admin.

Transport hit by IT outage

In the UK, Southern, Thameslink, Gatwick Express and Great Northern, says its services are experiencing widespread IT issues.

Among the impacted firms are Ryanair, with the airline posting to its website: “Potential disruptions across the network (Fri 19 July) due to a global third party system outage.

“Affected passengers will be notified and any passengers travelling across the network on Fri 19 July should check their Ryanair app for the latest updates on their flight.

“We advise passengers to arrive at the airport three hours in advance of their flight to avoid any disruptions.

“We regret any inconvenience caused to passengers by this third party IT issue, which is outside of Ryanair’s control and affects all airlines operating across the network.”

Edinburgh Airport said the IT outage is causing longer waiting times.

A spokesperson said: “An IT system outage means wait times are longer than usual at the airport.

“This outage is affecting many other businesses, including airports.

“Work is ongoing to resolve this and our teams are on hand to assist where we can. Passengers are thanked for their patience.”

A spokesperson for AGS Airports, which owns and operates Aberdeen, Glasgow and Southampton airports, said: “Our three airports are largely unaffected by the current global IT issues.

"At present a small number of airlines have moved to manual check-in and some retailers are only accepting cash payments.”

We're also hearing some hospitals and healthcare settings are being impacted.

Cybersecurity expert Troy Hunt also reported seeing issues at global cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike, with Australian telecoms firm Telstra posting to X, formerly Twitter, that the worldwide outage was “because of a global issue affecting both Microsoft and Crowdstrike”.

Users all over the world have been reporting issues on social media platforms.

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