Due To Global IT Blackout Scandal, CrowdStrike CEO Called Congress

The CEO of CrowdStrike, George Kurtz, was summoned by the US Congress (photo: x @ElEconomista_)

JAKARTA - The House Homeland Security Committee has written a letter to CrowdStrice CEO George Kurtz. They asked the CEO to testify before Congress. The letter stated that the committee wanted Kurtz to explain how the global IT blackout took place, and what steps were taken to prevent similar incidents in the future.

The demand comes as companies around the world struggle to recover from the global IT outage, where Delta airline says it has canceled 4,000 flights since Friday 19 July and waived disruptions will continue for another few days.

An error in an update by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrice caused a large-scale global IT outage on Friday, where many other businesses and organizations are still working to restore their systems online.

CrowdStrice security software is used by a large number of other companies and organizations, and the wrong update causes Windows PCs around the world to crash and enter the reboot loop, making it completely unusable.

Airlines around the world had to cancel thousands of flights. Even Reuters reported that the Delta airline appeared to be experiencing the biggest difficulties in recovery.

CEO Ed Bastian on Monday, July 22, said it would take several more days for the US airline to restore its operations. Delta has canceled more than 4,000 flights since last Friday, leaving thousands of its customers stranded across the country. In contrast, disruptions to other major US airlines have largely eased.

The Washington Post also reported that Congress demanded explanations and guarantees from the company.

The congressional committee on Monday summoned the chief executive of a security firm whose update failed to trigger a massive computer outage on Friday to testify, according to a letter exclusively shared with The Washington Post, deepening the scrutiny of lawmakers against the incident.

One update one of the companies could have such a bad impact, but what is unknown is how CrowdStrice managed to issue the update globally without first testing it. This will be one of the questions Congress will ask, in which Kurtz is asked to confirm no later than tomorrow that he will agree to testify.

The committee will also ask what steps the company is taking to ensure this never happens again.