The global IT outage that has affected banks, airports, hospitals, and thousands upon thousands of businesses has largely spared Las Vegas casinos. Reports from the gambling capital of the world are largely positive, at least when it comes to casinos.
According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Green Valley Ranch appears to be the only area casino that was really affected, as all its slot machines were down on Thursday night. Las Vegas Strip and downtown casinos were all systems go. Some video screens at Red Rock Resort in Summerlin displayed the infamous Microsoft Windows “blue screen of death,” but the venue was fine otherwise.
Online sportsbook BetMGM’s app was victimized by the worldwide systems crash and still appears to be down as of this writing.
225 delayed and 81 canceled flights on Friday morning alone
Harry Reid International Airport, like all airports around the world, was hit hard. Most major airlines were affected by the problems, resulting in 225 delayed and 81 canceled flights on Friday morning alone. Thousands of flights have been canceled in the US since Thursday night and tens of thousands of flights have been delayed. Travelers are still stuck at the airport, many unable to find hotel rooms, others unsure of what they should even do or when they will make it home.
The global computer outage is the result of security software from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike. The company pushed out a software update to computers running Microsoft Windows which contained a “defect” and crashed systems around the world. It is not a cyberattack like the one that affected MGM Resorts International last year, but it is also a situation that is more complicated to resolve than just rebooting computers or rolling back updates.