Sky News has been knocked off air amid widespread IT outages affecting businesses across the world including broadcasters, airlines and banks.

In a statement on the Sky News online page, YouTube and TV channel on Friday morning, the broadcaster apologised for the disruption.

A Sky News spokesperson said in a statement to the PA news agency: “Sky News has not been able to broadcast live TV this morning, we apologise for the interruption.

“All the news is still available online, on the Sky News app, website, and across our social media accounts.

“We are working hard to restore all services.”

Sky News sports presenter Jacquie Beltrao shared a photo of the breakfast team in a post on X, formerly Twitter, and said the team were “obviously not on air” but that they are “trying” to return.

The channel returned to screens shortly after 9am, albeit with a disrupted format.

Major institutions across the world have reported computer issues disrupting services, with some airlines warning of delays and some airports grounding flights.

Overnight, IT giant Microsoft confirmed it was investigating an “issue” with its 365 apps and operating systems, and although it said it had recovered some services, it warned that the issue was ongoing and users should expect “service degradation”, according to a status page on its website.

According to cybersecurity expert Troy Hunt, an IT issue at global cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike was causing much of the outage.

Britain’s biggest train company Govia Thameslink Railway is also among those who have affected, warning passengers to expect disruption due to “widespread IT issues”.