Delta Airlines has voiced its frustration with CrowdStrike in a letter released Thursday, as tensions between the two companies escalate following last month's global network failure.
The U.S.-based airline accused the cybersecurity firm of "negligence," claiming it was forced to cancel thousands of flights, leading to a loss of at least $500 million (£392 million).
CrowdStrike has denied sole responsibility for Delta's flight disruptions, pointing out that other carriers resumed operations while Delta's issues persisted.
Delta now faces a class-action lawsuit filed by affected passengers.
The global network outage, which originated from CrowdStrike on July 19, was traced back to a corrupted software update sent to customers. Microsoft estimated that the glitch disabled 8.5 million Windows devices worldwide.
Delta's services remained disrupted for days after the incident, even as other airlines recovered. The airline canceled around 7,000 flights over five days until July 24 and is now under investigation by the U.S. Department of Transportation.
Delta has blamed both CrowdStrike and Microsoft for the disruptions and has threatened legal action. Both companies have rejected Delta's claims of responsibility.
In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday, Delta CEO Ed Bastian called the situation "unacceptable," stating, "Our customers and employees deserve better." He noted that the technology meltdown impacted 1.3 million Delta customers.
CrowdStrike responded on Sunday, saying it would "aggressively" defend itself if Delta proceeds with legal action. Microsoft also vowed to fight back, adding that its preliminary review showed Delta was operating with outdated IT infrastructure compared to its competitors.
Delta's attorney, David Boies, countered in a letter to CrowdStrike on Thursday, asserting that "there is no basis—none—to suggest that Delta was in any way responsible for the faulty software that crashed systems around the world." He emphasized that Delta had invested billions in its technology and struggled to restore operations due to its reliance on Microsoft and CrowdStrike.
CrowdStrike has accused Delta of promoting a "misleading narrative."
Meanwhile, a lawsuit has been filed against Delta on behalf of passengers whose flights were canceled. The legal action claims that "no other U.S. airline canceled one-tenth as many flights" and alleges that Delta failed to properly compensate passengers, even asking them to sign waivers releasing the airline from legal claims.
Many airlines rely on Microsoft's Office 365 for scheduling, and the CrowdStrike failure disrupted those systems, forcing airlines to resort to manual scheduling.
CrowdStrike is also facing a lawsuit from its shareholders, who accuse the company of making "false and misleading" statements about its software testing. CrowdStrike has denied these allegations.
source:BBC
