Kenya Airways Confirms Challenge To Booking System As Global IT Outage Hits Airlines
The outage has hit multiple countries in Europe as well as those in the US and Australia, with a similar challenge finding its way to airlines in Kenya.
Marvin Chege 
National airline, Kenya Airways has announced an outage that hit its booking system, amidst reports of a global cyber outage that has hit airlines all over the world.
The outage has hit multiple countries in Europe as well as those in the US and Australia, with a similar challenge finding its way to airlines in Kenya.
Following the outage, Kenyans were unable to access the online booking system for most airlines, forcing them to advise customers to switch to the manual booking system.
"We are currently experiencing a system outage that has affected our booking system as a result of a global system outage. Customers are advised to expect slower than usual service as we implement our Business Continuity Plan," Kenya Airways said in a statement.
Passengers to Mumbai going through the check-in process at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport on March 6, 2019. /KENYA AIRWAYS
"Customers can visit our booking offices to get assistance. We apologize for any inconvenience caused. We will share further updates once the issue is resolved."
Keeping its booking systems is Kenya Airways', and by default, all airlines' top priority given the millions of passengers they serve daily.
This means that even the slightest of inconveniences on their part can pose severe consequences, including disruption of travel plans among passengers, no matter the urgency, as well as millions of shillings lost in the booking process.
The outage, according to initial investigations, was attributed to an update done by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, hitting institutions and businesses using the Windows system.
"CrowdStrike is actively working with customers impacted by a defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts. Mac and Linux hosts are not impacted. This is not a security incident or cyberattack. The issue has been identified, and isolated and a fix has been deployed.
"We refer customers to the support portal for the latest updates and will continue to provide complete and continuous updates on our website. We further recommend organizations ensure they’re communicating with CrowdStrike representatives through official channels. Our team is fully mobilised to ensure the security and stability of CrowdStrike customers," CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz stated.
A spokesperson for Microsoft revealed that a resolution to the tech outage was 'forthcoming'.
The latest update led to system outages for most airlines and banks across the world. In most countries, authorities were forced to suspend flights as well as train services.
Bank services were also affected by the IT outage as online services were unavailable. So far, no bank in Kenya has reported such an outage.
