As airlines were forced to cancel flights and companies scrambled to deal with systems failures, China faced little disruption from Friday's CrowdStrike outage.
While CrowdStrike is hardly used in China, the company has warned about the cybersecurity threat the country poses, the BBC reported. Instead of using Microsoft, the Chinese generally rely on providers like Alibaba and Tencent Huawai, according to the BBC.
Most of the outages in China were from foreign companies, as hotel chains like Sheraton and Marriott had issues with checking people in, the BBC said, citing Chinese social media companies.
"It's a testament to China's strategic handling of foreign tech operations," Josh Kennedy-White, a cybersecurity expert based in Singapore, told the BBC. "Microsoft operates in China through a local partner, 21Vianet, which manages its services independently of its global infrastructure. This setup insulates China's essential services — like banking and aviation — from global disruptions."
China said it believes relying on domestic companies is good for national security. Huawei is banned in many countries, TikTok has been banned on many government devices, and the U.S. has worked to ban the sale of semiconductor chips to China, the BBC said.
A Chinese state-run newspaper published an editorial taking shots at the countries affected by the outage last week.
"Some countries constantly talk about security, generalize the concept of security, but ignore the real security, this is ironic," the editorial in The Global Times said. "Relying solely on top companies to lead network security efforts, as some countries advocate, may hinder not just the inclusive sharing of governance outcomes but also introduce new security risks."
Sam Barron ✉
Sam Barron has almost two decades of experience covering a wide range of topics including politics, crime and business.
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