After a single update caused by CrowdStrike The biggest IT outage in history last month, rippling throughout 8.5 million Windows devicesinfluencing 1.4 million passengersand causing banking disruptions at JPMorgan and Bank of Americathe last thing you expect is for the company to start charging prices.
But on Saturday, CrowdStrike accepted a huge, two-tiered trophy at the annual Pwnie Awards in Las Vegas — for “most epic fail.” Even more surprising? CrowdStrike President Michael Sentonas accepted the award in person.
“It's definitely not an award to be proud of receiving,” he said when accepting the award. “I think the team was surprised when I immediately said I was going to come and get him because we were horribly wrong.”
Sentonas said he wanted to bring the trophy back to CrowdStrike's headquarters in Austin, Texas, so that every CrowdStrike employee could see it and learn from the incident.
“From that perspective, I'll say thank you and take the trophy,” Setonas said. “We're going to put it in the right place and make sure everyone sees it.”
CrowdStrike accepting @PwnieAwards for “most epic fail” in @defcon. Class act. pic.twitter.com/e7IgYosHAE
– Dominic White? (@single) August 10, 2024
Although Sentonas graciously accepted the award, the July 19 CrowdStrike incident was more than a learning experience.
The outage was caused by a bug in a software update, which caused blue screen of death IN Microsoft Windows devices. Updating delayed over 10,000 flights resulted cancelled planned, interrupted operations 911 servicesand affected other operations around the globe.
It may have also cost Fortune 500 companies 5.4 billion dollars in damages. Delta wrote in a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing last week that the outage affected 1.3 million of its customersa day after some of those customers sued Delta in a class action on how the airline handled canceled flights.
CrowdStrike was too sued by air travelers last week in a class action. CrowdStrike shareholders too sued the company earlier this month after the company's share price fell 32% in the 12 days following the blackout.