Aussies up in arms over tech outage

Australians have lost it over a global tech outage that caused chaos at supermarkets across Australia.

Self-service checkouts at Woolworths and Coles displayed the blue screen of death and EFTPOS machines stopped working, with some stores only accepting cash during the outage.

“Better stock up on the toilet paper, Microsoft crash causing mayhem at Woolies,” one person quipped.

“I had to sign for my grocery shopping at the staffed register,” another wrote.

Shoppers took to social media as “huge” queues to pay at supermarkets continued to grow throughout Friday afternoon seeing people abandon trolley loads of groceries.

One Harris Farm Markets store had to lock their doors and turn away customers.

The outage also affected other stores including petrol stations, BWS, Bunnings and McDonald’s.

There were reports of people filling their cars up with fuel at the time the pump machine stopped working.

One person joked that if Bunnings and Dan Murphy stores were down the Australian economy would stop.

Triple 0 calls remained operational, but the NSW SES said it had activated its business continuity plans to remain operational and available to respond to calls for assistance during the outage.

Some train services were also affected, one person shared on X (formerly known as Twitter) that they were on a Vline train from Bendigo to Melbourne and were told the train would stop outside Clarkfield until further notice due to a “radio issue” at Southern Cross.

Airlines across Australia delayed flights and some were cancelled as passengers were unable to check-in or access their boarding passes.

Some passengers reported being left stranded at the Sunshine Coast Airport after they were unable to check-in for their flight, and images from Sydney airport showed major queues. 

Another person wrote on social media that hospitals in South Australia had also been affected, and that she was expecting her surgery to be cancelled because of the outage.

Some people were quick to point out issues with society going cashless, saying they had no confidence in going completely digital.

“Global IT issue shows we are really not ready to just rely on technology for everything,” a person commented on X.

“The entire world could come to a stop if we ever have a bigger outage. We’ve become too reliant on technology.”