Maritime ports, airports, and logistics businesses worldwide today are struggling to get freight flowing again after a software glitch froze Microsoft computer systems at companies worldwide.
The problem started before dawn on Friday when the Austin, Texas-based cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike issued an update to its “Falcon” cybersecurity product that mistakenly caused Microsoft Windows 10-based systems to stop working, according to supply chain risk management firm Everstream Analytics.
The glitch instantly halted or delayed airport check-in and flight operations at logistics hubs worldwide, including sites in major cities like Berlin-Brandenburg International Airport in Germany; Amsterdam Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands; Dublin Airport in Ireland; and other sites across Spain, Italy, India, Hong Kong, and more, the firm said.
In the U.S., the computer crash forced the Port of Los Angeles to cancel parts of its second shift and triggered operational delays at the Port of Mobile in Alabama.
“Within hours, the technical issues have resulted in widespread operational issues, most notably at some of the world’s major airlines, airports and seaports,” Everstream said in a release. “While some operators have been able to resume operations following the outages, it remains unclear how long it will take local ocean and air cargo operators to clear the backlog that accumulated due to the technical issues. Localized increases in port and airport congestion as well as cargo processing delays at these facilities should be anticipated in the coming days as well.”
The IT logjam comes at a time when air cargo supply chains were already strained, since global air freight demand in June increased by 13% compared to the same month in 2023, while air freight supply increased by a much lesser 3% year-on-year, according to air sector analyst firm Xeneta.
The result is less available capacity in the market and increasing costs for shippers, a situation that could quickly grow worse if today’s delays aren’t fixed fast, Niall van de Wouw, Xeneta’s chief airfreight officer, said in a release. “Air supply chains are highly complex, so a global disruption of this scale could have a severe impact. Planes and cargo are not where they are supposed to be, and it will take days or even weeks to fully resolve.”
“We have seen in 2024 how vulnerable our global maritime supply chains are following the disruption caused by conflict in the Red Sea,” van de Wouw said. “Now we see vulnerabilities exposed in our air supply chains due to IT failure. We benefit greatly from technology and have grown dependent on it – but there is a price to pay when things go wrong.”
In fact, the episode highlights a dangerous lack of diversity in supply chain technology platforms, according to a statement from Andrei Quinn-Barabanov, Supply Chain Industry Practice Lead at Moody’s. “Over-reliance on several key vendors in corporate IT highlights a broader need for supplier diversification," Quinn-Barabanov said. "It goes beyond infrastructure technology into customized and high-performance components and services where single, sole or dominant sources create consequential bottlenecks. Supplier diversification is much easier said than done, since it involves a risky and expensive process of developing a new product or service. These additional costs and risks are often dwarfed by a revenue, performance, and reputational hit originating in a key supplier failure.”
Editor's note: This article was revised on July 19 to add comments from Xeneta and Moody's.
