Fatal system error

A fatal system error (also known as a system crash, stop error, kernel error, or bug check) occurs when an operating system halts because it has reached a condition where it can no longer operate safely (i.e. where critical data could be lost or the system damaged in other ways).

For other uses, see Fatal error.

In Microsoft Windows, a fatal system error can be deliberately caused from a kernel-mode driver with either the KeBugCheck or KeBugCheckEx function. However, this should only be done as a last option when a critical driver is corrupted and is impossible to recover. This design parallels that in OpenVMS. The Unix kernel panic concept is very similar.

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