By D. Maan, Jadetimes News
CrowdStrike Faces Intense Backlash Over Apology Voucher Worth $10 After Huge IT Outage
The cybersecurity company CrowdStrike was attacked for its response after offering customers an apology of $10 in UberEats vouchers following a global IT outage that caused huge disruption across airlines, banks, and hospitals last week. The incident, triggered by a software update on Friday, affected 8.5 million computers worldwide.
In a staff and partner email, CrowdStrike acknowledged the extra workload caused by the outage: "To express our gratitude, your next cup of coffee or late night snack is on us!" the email read, including a code for a $10 credit.
That gesture, however, has been met with fierce criticism. One Redditor labeled it "absolute clown show," while another sarcastically commented, "I literally wanted to drive my car off a bridge this weekend and they bought me coffee. Nice." A person on LinkedIn who identified himself as a CrowdStrike partner chimed in, frustrated: "The gesture of a cup of coffee or Uber Eats credit as an apology doesn't seem to make up for the tens of thousands lost in man hours and customer trust due to the July 19 incident."
It deepened further when some of the recipients reported that these vouchers did not work, and CrowdStrike was later quoted as admitting that "Uber flagged it as fraud because of high usage rates."
The incident raises questions about the kind of financial redress CrowdStrike will offer customers who were affected. The announcement comes after the company pledged to enhance its process of testing software following an update that caused a fault content update for Windows systems, causing a mass outage. The update saw millions of PCs displaying "blue screens of death."
In a detailed post published Wednesday, CrowdStrike said that a "bug" in a system designed to monitor software updates for proper functionality was the real cause of the mess. The glitch allowed "problematic content data" in a file to slip by undetected. CrowdStrike said it will prevent similar incidents in the future by better testing software and scrutinizing its developers.
The company's CEO, George Kurtz of CrowdStrike, has apologized for the extent of the outage. Meanwhile, cybersecurity experts have criticized CrowdStrike's response as a major oversight after the incident. "What's clear from the post-mortem is they didn't seem to have the right guardrails in place to prevent this type of incident or to reduce the risk of it occurring," cybersecurity consultant Daniel Card said.
The backlash, nonetheless, is representative of the anger and frustration of CrowdStrike's customers and partners, who demand more substantial compensation measures and far better preventive steps.
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