Volkswagen's emissions scandal is bigger than just the 500,000 cars in the U.S. reported Monday, affecting 11 million vehicles worldwide, and the repercussions may force out CEO Martin Winterkorn.

Volkswagen admitted in a statement Tuesday that its internal investigation found the problem is much larger than first thought.

Volkswagen was discovered to be using software that allowed its vehicles to pass emissions tests, but that software was disabled during normal driving, The New York Times reports. Cars equipped with this software were initially found in the U.S., but now it has been discovered that there are a total of 11 million cars with this same problem.

Most of the diesel cars that are involved in this scandal are likely found in Europe, but Volkswagen would not confirm this. The company is the dominant carmaker in Europe, where one out of every four cars sold is a Volkswagen.

Volkswagen says it is setting aside about half a year of profits, which is 6.5 billion euros or about $7.3 billion, to assist with the cost of fixing the cars in order to make them pollution compliant. The money will also cover fines that are likely coming to the carmaker.

This is the first statement in which Volkswagen confirmed that cars outside the U.S. may also contain the software, which the Environmental Protection Agency accused the company of using to evade pollution tests. Prior to the statement, Volkswagen only admitted that 500,000 vehicles in the U.S. were affected.

Because the scandal has reached such a big scale, Volkswagen's CEO Martin Winterkorn is likely on his way out. The Economic Times, citing the German newspaper Tagesspiegel, reports that Winterkorn will be replaced by head of Porsche Matthias Mueller. Volkswagen has not commented on this report.

The German automaker released a video of Winterkorn apologizing for the scandal, promising to use all the company's resources to remedy the issue.

"I am deeply sorry that we have broken this trust," he said. "I would like to make a formal apology to our customers, to the authorities and to the general public for this misconduct. We will do everything necessary to reverse the damage. And we will do everything necessary to win back trust -- step by step."

The initial report of 500,000 cars on Monday caused Volkswagen's stock to drop 20 percent. On Tuesday, the stock dropped another 20 percent to reach its four-year low. Analysts have changed their outlooks and price targets on the company as well.

Volkswagen could see fines of up to $18 billion from the EPA, as well as other lawsuits from angry customers.

Watch Winterkorn's full apology: