McDonald’s said on Friday a technology outage had disrupted operations at many of its outlets worldwide, including Japan and Australia, but ruled out the possibility of a cybersecurity incident.
International: McDonald’s suffers global tech outage, rules out cyber security incident. Many McDonald’s stores in Japan stopped taking in-person and mobile customer orders because of the system disruption, a spokesperson at McDonald’s Holdings Company Japan said, adding that the company was working to restore operations soon.
“We are aware of a technology outage, which impacted our restaurants; the issue is now being resolved,” McDonald’s said in a statement.
McDonald’s Australia said some of its restaurants were back online serving customers after the outage and were working to restore the remaining stores.
The fast food chain has about 40,000 restaurants worldwide, with more than 14,000 stores in the United States. It operates nearly 3,000 stores across Japan and roughly 1,000 in Australia, its websites for the regions show.
The outage seemed to be have affected customers in Hong Kong, New Zealand and the UK as well, with people taking to social media to complain about disruptions at stores.
The New York Times said McDonald’s Hong Kong was experiencing a “computer system failure”, stating that the mobile ordering and self-ordering kiosks were not functioning.
Earlier this month, Meta-owned Facebook and Instagram also faced technical issues that disrupted global services for hundreds of thousands of users for more than two hours.
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McDonald’s Corporation is an American multinational fast food chain, founded in 1940 as a restaurant operated by Richard and Maurice McDonald, in San Bernardino, California, United States. They rechristened their business as a hamburger stand, and later turned the company into a franchise, with the Golden Arches logo being introduced in 1953 at a location in Phoenix, Arizona. In 1955, Ray Kroc, a businessman, joined the company as a franchise agent and in 1961 bought out the McDonald brothers. Previously headquartered in Oak Brook, Illinois, it moved to nearby Chicago in June 2018. McDonald’s is also a real estate company through its ownership of around 70% of restaurant buildings and 45% of the underlying land (which it leases to its franchisees).
McDonald’s is the world’s largest fast food restaurant chain, serving over 69 million customers daily in over 100 countries in more than 40,000 outlets as of 2021. McDonald’s is best known for its hamburgers, cheeseburgers and french fries, although their menu also includes other items like chicken, fish, fruit, and salads. Their bestselling licensed item are their french fries, followed by the Big Mac. The McDonald’s Corporation revenues come from the rent, royalties, and fees paid by the franchisees, as well as sales in company-operated restaurants. McDonald’s is the world’s second-largest private employer with 1.7 million employees (behind Walmart with 2.3 million employees), the majority of whom work in the restaurant’s franchises. As of 2022, McDonald’s has the sixth-highest global brand valuation.
McDonald’s has been subject to criticism over the health effects of its products, its treatment of employees, and its participation in various legal cases.
McDonald’s suffers global tech outage, rules out cyber security incident
