CrowdStrike hit with class-action lawsuit by airline passengers over global outage
AUSTIN - A trio of airline passengers have filed a federal class-action lawsuit against CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity technology company linked to a global outage that affected airlines, emergency services and various businesses from banks to hospitals.
Passengers Julio Del Rio, Jack Murphy and Steven Bixby filed their complaint in federal court in Austin, Texas, where the company is based.
According to court documents obtained by FOX Television Stations, the passengers said they had to contend with significant delays, cancelations and being stranded at airports as a result of the global outage.
The passengers are suing for negligence and public nuisance, among other counts.
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The company has not responded to this lawsuit.
CrowdStrike and the global outage
CrowdStrike blames a bug in an update that allowed its cybersecurity systems to push bad data out to millions of customer computers, setting off last month’s global tech outage that grounded flights, took TV broadcasts off air and disrupted banks, hospitals and retailers.
Thousands of flights were canceled and tens of thousands were delayed, leading to long lines at airports in the U.S., Europe, Asia and Latin America. Airlines lost access to check-in and booking services in the heart of the summer travel season.
Passengers wait for check-in counters to open at Ninoy Aquino International Airport, amid a global IT disruption caused by a Microsoft outage and a Crowdstrike IT problem, on July 19, 2024 in Manila, Philippines. (Photo by Ezra Acayan/Getty Images)
The problem involved an "undetected error" in the content-configuration update for its Falcon platform affecting Windows machines, the Texas-based company said.
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A bug in the content-validation system allowed "problematic content data" to be deployed to CrowdStrike’s customers. That triggered an "unexpected exception" that caused a Windows operating system crash, the company said.
Other lawsuits CrowdStrike is facing
In a class action lawsuit filed earlier this month in Austin, Texas federal court, shareholders accused CrowdStrike of making materially false and misleading statements about its software testing. They say those false statements came to light during the outage, which disrupted airlines, banks, hospitals and emergency lines around the world.
Plaintiffs are the Plymouth County Retirement Association of Plymouth, Massachusetts. They seek unspecified damages for holders of CrowdStrike Class A shares between Nov. 29, 2023 and July 29, 2024.
CrowdStrike outage still being felt at airports around the world
Last week's global CrowdStrike outage is still being felt at airports around the world. Flights were grounded for hours, or at some airports, days. FOX 29 Philadelphia's Hank Flynn joins LiveNOW from FOX to share what patrons at the Philadelphia International Airport are experiencing.
The complaint points to statements from Kurtz on a March 5 conference call, when the CEO assured investors that CrowdStrike's software was "validated, tested and certified."
CrowdStrike said the lawsuit "lacks merit" and promised to "vigorously defend the company" in a statement. CEO George Kurtz and Chief Financial Officer Burt Podbere are also named as defendants.
CrowdStrike fights with Delta
CrowdStrike is disputing Delta Air Lines over who is to blame for damage that the airline suffered after a global technology outage.
Delta’s CEO has threatened to sue CrowdStrike for what he said was $500 million in lost revenue and extra costs related to thousands of canceled flights.
RELATED: Delta struggles to recover from global tech outage, stranding tens of thousands
A lawyer for CrowdStrike says, however, that the company’s liability should be less than $10 million.
The U.S. Department of Transportation is investigating why Delta took longer to recover than other airlines. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said his department would also look into complaints about Delta’s customer service, including long waits for help and reports that unaccompanied minors were stranded at airports.
FOX Business and the Associated Press contributed to this report. This story was reported from Los Angeles.