Hundreds of companies around the world have suffered from Windows-based devices being down, said Alexander Leskin, head of risk research at Kaspersky Lab.
He told a Novosti correspondent that it is still difficult to estimate the recovery time, because this problem must be fixed manually on each device, and there are thousands of them.
“According to reports from open sources, the number of affected companies and devices used in them may reach hundreds and thousands, respectively. At the current stage, it is difficult to estimate how long it will take to correct the situation, because the difficulty lies in the fact that when such a problem occurs, each device must be rebooted individually. It must be loaded into safe mode manually; it is not possible to do this with the help of control tools and means,” he added.
The expert noted that "this is indeed a very serious problem and it has affected many operations, including vital infrastructure."
According to the expert, to avoid such situations, manufacturers of information security tools should be as responsible as possible for the quality of the updates they release. It is also important to observe the principle of granular releases. This means that they are not distributed globally to all customers, but gradually, so that in the event of any unexpected failure, it can be quickly identified and contained.
On Friday, the world woke up to a technical glitch that paralyzed markets, airports and services around the world. Microsoft users reported widespread internet outages, hours after the technology company announced that it was gradually working to fix a problem affecting access to Microsoft 365 applications and services.
The Microsoft outage is linked to a new update from CrowdStrike, a cybersecurity software company. This has caused disruptions across a range of sectors, with stock exchanges, airlines and banks the hardest hit.