CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz might soon testify to the US Congress after one of its security updates ignited a global IT outage that crippled many business operations for hours.
First reported by The Washington Post, House leaders are calling for Kurtz to appear in front of its Homeland Security committee to appease concerns in what many consider to be "the largest IT outage in history."
(Photo : Yuichi Yamazaki/AFP via Getty Images)
Lawmakers claimed that the inquiry is intended to learn more about the "mitigation steps" CrowdStrike has taken and is currently taking in response to the outage. The hearing is scheduled for this Wednesday.
Microsoft, whose Windows computers were primarily affected by the outage, earlier reported that over 8.5 million devices were impacted by the outage.
Several major businesses, airports, banks, and even healthcare facilities have to pause operations following the outage.
Microsoft has since issued a recovery tool to resolve the faulty CrowdStrike update out of the affected computers.
Also Read: Microsoft Confirms 8.5 Million Devices Experienced CrowdStrike-Related Outage
CrowdStrike Outage Leveraged to Launch Malware, Phishing, Cyberattack Attempts
Amid the global outage, several news outlets have reported a surge in cyberattack attempts as threat actors take advantage of the situation to target vulnerable networks.
As Security Week reported, multiple fake hotfixes were detected hours after the outage to deceive affected CrowdStrike customers into giving their private data to bad actors.
Other cybercrime groups were also noted for launching malware to susceptible IT networks, either to further disrupt operations or take control of connected devices.
Government agencies, Microsoft, and CrowdStrike have already alerted affected customers to be careful against suspicious emails offering a supposed fix on the faulty update.
Related Article: Microsoft Outage Hits Global Operations of Bank, Airlines
Potential Lawsuits Loom Over CrowdStrike
Due to the scale of the outage's impact, several lawsuits against CrowdStrike could already be expected.
Several businesses in North America sued CDK Global earlier for the digital service outage caused by a ransomware attack last month.
The same scenario could likely happen to CrowdStrike, although no business or trade groups have yet declared plans to make the cybersecurity software provider liable.
