Casinos Go Haywire amid Worldwide CrowdStrike IT Outage

Even the Sphere was hit by the “blue screen of death” on Friday, after a worldwide IT outage brought many casino operations (and the Las Vegas airport) to a halt. (Image: via X / LasVegasLocally)

An ongoing IT outage has disrupted operations at casino, sportsbooks, and a variety of other businesses around the world on Friday, after an update by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike caused disruptions for customers running on Microsoft Windows operating systems.

At first problems at casinos looked reminiscent to last fall’s massive cyberattack that ground operations to a near-halt at MGM and Caesars properties. But it soon became clear this was different. 

CrowdStrike confirmed that the outages were not related to hacking or cyberattacks, and promised to fix the problem as quickly as possible, though it also acknowledged that some systems would need manual fixes that would take more time. 

CrowdStrike Outage Disrupts Casino Operations in America, Abroad

Critical entities such as airlines, hospitals, courts, and television stations were forced to suspend or reduce operations early on Friday, as they waited for systems to return to normal. By late Friday afternoon, it appeared that most, but not all, systems had been restored for most businesses.

Among those impacted were businesses throughout the gaming industry that relied on CrowdStrike’s “Falcon sensor,” a tool used to prevent cyberattacks that was the focus of the company’s faulty update. 

In Las Vegas, the problems appeared to be limited to only certain casinos. Slot machines went down from late Thursday night into Friday morning at Green Valley Ranch, while Caesars Palace and Red Rock Resort saw error messages on some machines, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. 

People at other Station casinos shared their observations with influencers such as VitalVegas and LasVegasLocally showing various casino systems were offline before anyone understood what was happening.

The above was at Durango, and customers experienced similar outages inside Boulder Station:

By morning it was clear the outages weren’t just at casinos.

At Harry Reid International Airport, hundreds of flights were canceled on Friday, creating temporary mayhem.

Gulf Coast casinos in Mississippi were also impacted, with casino floor systems and non-casino amenities being impacted. However, Mississippi Gaming Commission executive director Jay McDaniel said that casinos didn’t lose any critical systems that forced them to close.

“Surveillance isn’t down or anything like that,” McDaniel told the Sun Herald. 

Perhaps the most dramatic impacts for the casino industry were felt in Australia, where the outage began impacting casinos on Friday afternoon. All three casinos owned and operated by Star – located in Brisbane, the Gold Coast, and Sydney – were forced to close their doors to the public for the evening. Online sports betting firm TAB was also forced to suspend its services for several hours across the country. 

Online Gambling Operations Also Impacted

Online betting was impacted in North America as well. 

“BetMGM is experiencing temporary issues due to global IT outages,” BetMGM Customer Care wrote on X on Friday morning. “We are working hard to resolve this and will update customers when we are up and running.” 

As of late afternoon on Friday, BetMGM’s website was still down. The issue also appeared to be impacting other Entain brands, as Canadian sportsbook Sports Interaction was also down on Friday.

While many businesses have been able to fix the problem in a matter of hours, others may take far longer. That’s because the fix requires manual work, including the deletion of corrupted files.

“Given that CrowdStrike has a ton of customers, a ton of Fortune 500 customers, and they have likely millions of [computers] under management, this causes a bigger issue,” Forrester analyst Allie Mellen told the Associated Press. “It is going to be a long and arduous process.” 

The outage once again shined a light on the vulnerabilities of the gaming industry in a world that is increasingly reliant on critical information technology systems to function. Last September, both MGM resorts and Caesars Entertainment were targeted by cyberattacks. Caesars ultimately paid a $15 million ransom to have their systems unlocked, while MGM estimated that it lost $100 million due to outages and other costs associated with the attack.