It could take days before the global technology outage that grounded flights and knocked banks and hospital systems offline is fully resolved, Australian authorities say.

The massive disruption is being described as the biggest IT outage ever experienced.

The outage was caused by a faulty software update by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, which affected computers around the world running Microsoft Windows. The company said it was not a hacking incident or cyberattack, and apologised, saying a fix was on the way.

The Australian government held an emergency meeting last night where officials were briefed by CrowdStrike.

The government’s Cyber and Infrastructure Security deputy secretary, Hamish Hansford, reassured Australians there was “no reason to panic” but said the fix could take days.

“Over the next hours and days, we hope that this incident will self resolve as technical responses kick in,” Hansford said.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese acknowledged the country’s concern over the outage.

“My government is working closely with the National Cyber Security Coordinator,” he said. 

“There is no impact to critical infrastructure, government services or triple zero services at this stage.”

Victoria Emergency, however, reported fire alarms were not automatically calling firefighters and urged the public to dial triple zero instead.

Among the companies affected were supermarkets, with self-serve checkouts going offline, as well as media outlets, financial service providers and airports and airlines. 9news.com.au was also impacted, unable to publish stories.

Sydney Airports experienced issues with check-in systems for several hours.

Jetstar cancelled all flights in Australia and New Zealand until 2am, but all airlines appeared confident things would return to normal on Saturday.

Grocery stores, banks impacted

Customers at some major Coles and Woolworths were not able to use the self service checkouts, with a handful of manned registers still working at most stores. 

Woolworths has said all except six stores were open and trading across the country with fewer registers available than normal, and thanking customers for their patience. 

A small number of online orders were unable to be fulfilled, they also said.

Online banking customers have been unable to make PayID payments, Commbank said. 

Businesses, both small and large, were unable to use Windows operating systems, as well as Microsoft 365 applications and Xero. 

The impact was global, with the BBC reporting the London Stock exchange systems was down.

In the US airlines United, American, Delta and Allegiant were all grounded.

Personal use computers will not be impacted by the outage, Technology expert Trevor Long told 9News. 

Australia’s National Cyber Security Coordinator Lieutenant General Michelle McGuinness says there is nothing to suggest the issue has been caused by a cyberattack. 

“I am aware of a large-scale technical outage affecting a number of companies and services across Australia this afternoon,” Lieutenant General Michelle McGuinness said. 

“Our current information is this outage relates to a technical issue with a third-party software platform employed by affected companies.

“There is no information to suggest it is a cyber security incident. We continue to engage across key stakeholders.” 

Technology expert Trevor Long says computers impacted appear to have entered fail-safe mode. 

“This could well scale up and be one of the biggest outages of a vendor at a single time,” he told 9News.

He said that timezone-wise, Australia was most affected.

“This will last many more hours,” he said.

“Essentially it’s a software layer, it’s a firewall.”

“My information is that CrowdStrike has found a fix, whether that’s been deployed or not … is yet to be determined.”

He said that the company will first need to fix it, then roll the fix out.

“This won’t affect an individual on your own computer…the shops…small businesses, that’s where you’ll see the impact.” 

“CrowdStrike Falcon has been linked to this widespread outage,” Toby Murray from the University of Melbourne said. 

“CrowdStrike is a global cyber security and threat intelligence company. Falcon is what is known as an Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) platform, which monitors the computers that it is installed on to detect intrusions and respond to them…

“If Falcon is suffering a malfunction then it could be causing a widespread outage for two reasons: one, Falcon is widely deployed on many computers, and two because of Falcon’s privileged nature. 

“Falcon is a bit like anti-virus software: it is regularly updated with information about the latest online threats (so it can better detect them). We have certainly seen anti-virus updates in the past causing problems.

“It is possible that today’s outage may have been caused by a buggy update to Falcon.”

Microsoft on its Azure cloud software status report site, said that around 6 pm (US time), the service went down for some customers in the Central US region – “including failures with service management operations and connectivity or availability of services.” 

The company said it determined the cause and is working to fix it.

Nine has received some reports of systems slowly returning online at the time of writing (5.30pm), including the Sydney Airport systems. 

Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neill said CrowdStrike had attended the federal government’s National Coordination Mechanism meeting earlier this evening to reassure there is no evidence of a cyber-security incident. 

“This is a technical issue, caused by a CrowdStrike update to its customers,” she said,

“They have issued a fix for this, allowing affected companies and organisations to reboot their systems without the problem. 

“The company has informed us that most issues should be resolved through the fix they have provided, but given the size and nature of this incident it may take some time to resolve.”

Governments are closely engaged at all levels, focused on bringing together the affected parties and ensuring government entities institute the fix as quickly as possible. 

Further updates will be issued as required.

Melbourne Airport is experiencing a global technology issue which is impacting check-in procedures for some airlines. Passengers flying with these airlines this afternoon are advised to allow a little extra time to check-in. Please check with your airline for flight updates.

Commonwealth Bank of Australia

“We are aware of a large-scale technical outage affecting a number of companies.

“This outage relates to a technical issue with a third-party software platform.

“We are urgently investigating any impacts to our systems and services.

“We know some customers have been unable to make PayID payments. If you are unable to use PayID, you’re still able to make payments between your accounts or pay someone using their BSB and account number

“We’re sorry for the inconvenience. Thanks for your patience while we work through the impacts.”

Qantas is currently experiencing some impacts to systems due to a global software issue that is impacting a number of other businesses.

We are working with our providers to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.

Sydney Airport has also confirmed its systems are down due to the outage. 

“A global technical outage has impacted some airline operations and terminal services.

“Flights are currently arriving and departing however there may be some delays throughout the evening.

“We have activated our contingency plans with our airline partners and deployed additional staff to our terminals to assist passengers.

“Anyone travelling today should leave plenty of time to come to the airport and check with their airline regarding the status of their flight.”

Jetstar is currently impacted by a global software issue that’s impacting airlines and other businesses around the world. 

We are working with our providers to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. 

Virgin Australia is aware of a large-scale IT outage impacting multiple airlines and other businesses which is having an impact on our operations. We are working to resolve this issue as soon as possible. We appreciate the patience of all travellers as we work through a solution and will provide an update once more information is known.

Statement attributable to Coles:

“We are affected by a global technical issue which is disrupting some of our systems in our supermarkets and liquor stores. We are working quickly to get our systems back up and running and will provide further updates as we know more.”

From a Woolworths spokesperson

Some of our stores and other facilities have been impacted as a result of the global IT issue.

We thank customers for their patience and understanding.

Like a number of other organisations, global issues affecting CrowdStrike and Microsoft are disrupting some of our systems.

The issue is causing some holdups for some of our customers and we thank them for their patience.

There is no impact to our fixed or mobile network which continue to operate.

Calls to our Triple Zero contact centres are not affected, but we understand some state emergency services are also impacted and we are working with them to implement backup processes.

We are aware of a widespread and global system issue that is impacting online banking and some transactions. 

We apologise for any inconvenience. We are investigating and seek to restore service as quickly as possible.

Virgin Australia is aware of a large-scale IT outage impacting multiple airlines and other businesses which is having an impact on our operations. We are working to resolve this issue as soon as possible. We appreciate the patience of all travellers as we work through a solution and will provide an update once more information is known.

Victoria Police are currently able to receive and dispatch calls from Triple Zero Victoria. 

There are some internal application systems affected by the national outage, these are not impacting our ability to dispatch or respond to incidents.

Victoria Police are continuing to investigate and manage any ongoing impact the outage is having. 

The NSW Government is aware of an outage that is affecting a range of services. We understand, via the Commonwealth, that there is no information to suggest that this is a cyber incident. An initial assessment has taken place to assess the impact across our services. NSW emergency services remain operational and available to respond to any requests for assistance at this time, 000 calls can be made, and there are no impacts to health services. However, there are some impacts to transport as well as Service NSW. At this stage impacts are manageable, with business continuity plans in place to ensure minimal disruption to the community. This includes some emergency dispatch services being impacted, with manual processes promptly put in place. The NSW Government has stood up the relevant co-ordination arrangements and is working closely with the Commonwealth.

Transport: Buses will replace trains on the Hunter Line between Newcastle and Dungog/Scone. The train radio network has been impacted in this area and trains are not able to run safely. Trains are running again on the Southern Highlands Line between Campbeltown and Moss Vale/Goulburn after being impacted earlier by the outage. There are no impacts to other modes of public transport and no impacts to the wider Sydney Trains network. There are no adverse impacts to the road network and traffic lights are operational.

Service NSW: Some transactions are currently unavailable in Service NSW Centres and via the Contact Centre. Most digital transactions have not been impacted and customers are being encouraged to complete transactions via the Service NSW website where possible.