CrowdStrike CEO to testify about massive outage that halted flights and hospitals

CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz was called to testify before the House Homeland Security Committee over the major outage affecting Windows PCs spurred by a faulty update that brought flights, hospital procedures, and broadcasters to a halt on Friday, The Washington Post reported.

“Recognizing that Americans will undoubtedly feel the lasting, real-world consequences of this incident, they deserve to know in detail how this incident happened and the mitigation steps CrowdStrike is taking,” Homeland Security Chair Mark Green (R-TN) and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Subcommittee Chair Andrew Garbarino (R-NY) wrote in a letter later shared with The Verge. They asked that CrowdStrike schedule a hearing with the subcommittee by end of day Wednesday.

The letter signals that the cleanup for the technical failure is far from over for CrowdStrike. Even on Monday, three days after the initial meltdown, Delta was dealing with flight cancelations and Blue Screens of Death.

Kurtz assured the public on Friday in a social media post that the massive outage was “not a security or cyber incident.” Instead, he pointed to “an issue with a Falcon content update for Windows Hosts,” referring to the company’s security software.

CrowdStrike spokesperson Kevin Benacci said in a statement the company “is actively in contact with relevant Congressional Committees. Briefings and other engagement timelines may be disclosed at Members’ discretion.”