Government Agency Advises Public Against Testing 911 In Wake of CrowdStrike Outage

As much as someone may be tempted to dial 911 to make sure the emergency number works following the widespread CrowdStrike outage, authorities are coming across with this simple message: Don’t do it.

CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc. CRWD, a Texas-based cybersecurity firm that is used worldwide by businesses and government agencies that run on Microsoft Corp MSFT computers, experienced a colossal outage on Friday after performing an update to its antivirus software.

The global IT outage caused major disruptions to everything from airports to banks to law enforcement agencies — just about anything that relies on Microsoft computers.

Though it may take some time for CrowdStrike to fix the glitch, the BBC reported, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) strongly discourages the public from dialing 911 to see if the emergency number is up and running.

“The public should not call 911 to test if the service is working,” the federal agency told Benzinga on Friday.

Also Read: How To Fix CrowdStrike Issue Causing Blue Screen Of Death On Your Windows PC

“911 centers have continuity of operations and other plans in place and conduct drills to be prepared for potential outages. NHTSA is aware of outages affecting 911 call centers and stands ready to help as needed.”

Emergency call lines were unaffected in most major cities, but authorities in Oregon, Alaska and Arizona said some of their systems had been impacted by the CrowdStrike outage, the New York Times reported.

Agencies in most large cities such as New York, Atlanta and Miami said their emergency communications systems were not affected.

Emergency service outages have happened in other parts of the country earlier this year. Last month, emergency services in Massachusetts redirected 911 callers to alternative numbers after a firewall blocked incoming calls. In April, 911 callers experienced disruptions in some areas of Texas, all of South Dakota and Las Vegas.

Some people posted their frustration with the CrowdStrike disruption on X earlier in the day.

My wife’s medical practice can’t even see patients — no access to medical records, can’t send prescriptions electronically,” Bloomberg opinion columnist Conor Sen wrote on the social media platform on Friday.

Danish economist Jens Nordvig also chimed in on X regarding the disruption.

“Cannot use credit card on MTA,” he wrote. “Will be an interesting day.”

CRWD Price Action: CrowdStrike has dropped 10.29% to $307.75 as of Friday at publication, while Microsoft has slipped 0.70% to $437.28.

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