A massive global technology outage on Friday paralyzed airlines, financial institutions, media, the health system and even the Paris Olympics, leaving many older people wondering what is happening and, more importantly, what they will do about travel, doctor’s appointments and banking.
Summer vacation plans have been cancelled, scheduled medical treatments have been suddenly postponed, Windows computers have displayed the dreaded “blue screen” of death, indicating a system crash, and files in the Microsoft cloud can no longer be accessed.
The outage was found to be caused by a glitch in a Microsoft Windows update by CrowdStrike, a company that provides cybersecurity software widely used by companies to thwart hackers.
“This is not a security incident or cyber attack,” CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz said in a social media post. “A fix has been deployed.”
This should come as a relief to many, but confusion may continue and questions remain. Here we explain how you may be affected, and what seniors can do if they run into problems.
Thousands of travelers stranded and delayed during peak season
The technical outage hit airlines hard during the busy summer travel season, cancelling or delaying thousands of flights around the world.
More than 36,000 flights were delayed as of 4pm ET, according to the FlightAware tracking service. More than 8,300 flights were delayed and more than 2,500 canceled to and from the US. Delta, United and American Airlines were the top airlines when it came to cancelling flights.
Travelers found long lines at ticket counters as check-in was delayed or halted, according to the Associated Press. Airports and airlines in the United States, Australia, Europe and India reported problems with grounded flights.
By mid-morning, some systems were back online. Shortly after 8:30 a.m. Friday, Delta tweeted that it had resumed some flights and issued waivers to passengers. The airline encouraged passengers to use the Delta app or visit its website to manage their flights.
Many airlines, including American Airlines, Spirit Airlines and United Airlines, have issued waivers to allow passengers to make new arrangements. As the Department of Transportation tweeted: Flight Rights Here is some information to help you understand what the airline’s responsibilities are.
If delays or cancellations affect you, here are some things to keep in mind:
- The government requires airlines to provide full refunds to passengers if a flight is cancelled for any reason.
- The rules, announced in April, define a “significant change” to a flight and the delay period that will qualify for a refund. The new rules state that a significant change to a flight includes departure or arrival times of more than three hours for domestic flights and six hours for international flights.
- Be polite when making new travel plans at the airport, and a customer service representative may be willing to go the extra mile to help you.
