When a major Windows update went haywire, causing a global tech disaster that disrupted flights, banks, and public services, China barely felt the impact. Thanks to its push for technology independence, China’s systems, including airports and payment networks, stayed mostly unaffected. Experts are using this incident to highlight the risks of relying on foreign tech and stress the importance of building up local technology capabilities. This global tech meltdown underscores how vulnerable countries are to tech failures and the need for diversified, self-reliant systems to safeguard against future disruptions.

While the “blue screen of death” in Microsoft Windows affected millions of users globally, affecting banks, airlines, hospitals, and hotels, China escaped mostly unscathed because it attempted to maintain technological independence and self-sufficiency.

Chinese industry players and experts stated on Sunday that the global cybersecurity concerns raised by the Windows outage, which was caused by a faulty update in third-party cloud software and rendered millions of computers inoperable, underscored the significance of tech independence reports Global Times.

Analysts also pointed out that nations cannot rely on other companies for their economic and national security, since a single company’s error might cripple half of the world. To lessen their reliance on US tech companies, they advised other nations to conduct their research and development or to diversify their suppliers.

Conditional Immunity

According to media sources, an American cybersecurity technology company called CrowdStrike released a Windows software update on Friday that caused widespread disruptions in public services, halted payment networks globally, and suspended flights.

In China, the software breakdown had a far smaller effect. Experts stated that the technical malfunction had little effect on important infrastructure located throughout the Chinese mainland, including banks, airports, government agencies, and payment systems.

According to yicai.com, flight operations at airports throughout the Chinese mainland remained mostly regular since CrowdStrike cloud computing equipment was not sold there.

According to the study, just a few international hotel chains on the mainland were impacted by the incident, and domestic hotel companies like Home Inn and H World International were essentially unaffected.

“The majority of Chinese enterprises, especially state-owned companies as well as large private firms were largely unaffected,” Wang Liejun, a security expert from QI-ANXIN Technology Group Inc, told the Global Times on Sunday.

Wang pointed out that because CrowdStrike may have been installed on the computers of international businesses or their branches operating in China, the Microsoft outage may have had an impact on them.

According to Kong Xiangyan, head of 360 Endpoint Security department, the Global Times on Saturday, “Our early implementation of a replacement plan involving domestic hardware, operating systems, and application software can be greatly credited for the incident’s limited impact in China.”

“Domestic government and business entities have a large user base of Windows hosts, yet we were almost unaffected by such a large-scale incident. This is because Chinese users can choose their own security products. This highlights to domestic entities, from government to individual users, the significant importance of China’s self-reliance and strength in the cybersecurity industry and technology,” Xiao Xinguang, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and chief software architect from Chinese cybersecurity company Antiy, told the Global Times on Sunday.

Experts observed that in the context of the US’s tech war against China, which prevents foreign hardware and software from entering the Chinese market, China has increased its attempts to achieve tech independence. Rather, they said that China’s quick scientific advancement is a result of US pressure.

China’s ability to prevent cybersecurity breaches in the face of a complicated external environment is demonstrated by its relative resilience to the global outage. Furthermore, Wang Peng, an associate research fellow at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, stated on Sunday that this has increased domestic users’ trust in domestic network security software and given more market opportunities for domestic brands because Chinese enterprises primarily use domestic antivirus software and were less affected by this incident.

Businesses and individual users alike should understand that it is challenging for a single technology or product to offer complete security protection, according to Wang Peng, who spoke with the Global Times. Thus, it is necessary to set up a diverse network security protection system that uses several security technologies.

Global Alert

According to Reuters, Microsoft announced on Friday that the root cause of the disruption of its Windows 365 apps and services has been resolved; nevertheless, some customers are still experiencing the aftereffects.

Worldwide, the “blue screen of death” affected some 8.5 million Windows machines on Friday. Although it might seem like a lot, the business told Reuters that represents less than 1% of all Windows computers globally.

While statistical proportions can be used to evaluate risks at a macro level, Xiao stated that victims of system accidents suffer a 100% loss. Digital infrastructure plays a critical role in modern economic societies. He pointed out that incidents involving digital infrastructure have the potential to spread and intensify in a domino effect, compounding into social systems and physical space.

The London Stock Exchange announced during Friday’s Asian trading session that a worldwide technical problem was impeding the publication of news on its website.

Australian news sites stated that the loss of computer systems caused disruptions to banks, media broadcasters, airlines, and telecom providers. A few banks in New Zealand said they were offline.

Russia’s Ministry of Digital Development, Communications, and Mass Media notably declared on Friday that the nation’s banks and airlines had not exhibited any symptoms of being affected by the outage.

“The situation with Microsoft once again shows the importance of import substitution of foreign software, primarily at critical information infrastructure facilities,” the ministry said.

The IT problems, according to experts, emphasize the need to lessen reliance on US technology. They warned of the repercussions if US large tech businesses deliberately target a country for sabotage, given that a single software update has the power to halt the networks of many nations.

According to Wang Peng, there may be problems associated with an excessive reliance on the technology products of a specific nation or region, including supply chain interruptions, technological embargoes, and security lapses.

“With the global development of technology, countries have made remarkable progress in the field of information technology. The introduction of multiple suppliers means that more technology paths and product solutions can be chosen to meet different needs and reduce cybersecurity risks,” Wang Peng said.

The world’s tech industry must become less dependent on oligopolistic firms. China is leading the way in this regard as national businesses grow and prosper. According to Xiao, the Chinese internet information sector will give other nations—particularly poor nations—an extra choice when it comes to digitalization and cybersecurity protection.

Recently, GreatGameInternational reported that a faulty update from CrowdStrike caused widespread chaos, rendering hundreds of thousands of Windows computers and servers unusable worldwide and affecting major sectors such as transport, broadcasting, finance, and retail.