CrowdStrike says it has revamped several testing, validation, and update rollout processes to prevent a repeat of the embarrassing July outage that caused widespread disruption on Windows systems around the world.
CrowdStrike (CRWD.O), opens new tab has been sued by shareholders who said the cybersecurity company defrauded them by concealing how its inadequate software testing could cause the July 19 global outage that crashed more than 8 million computers.
In a proposed class action filed on Tuesday night in the Austin, Texas federal court, shareholders said they learned that CrowdStrike's assurances about its technology were materially false and misleading when a flawed software update disrupted airlines, banks, hospitals and emergency lines around the world.
Just after midnight Eastern Time on July 19, 2024, the enterprise cybersecurity company CrowdStrike YOLOed a software update to millions of Windows machines. Or as they put it:
On July 19, 2024 at 04:09 UTC, as part of ongoing operations, CrowdStrike released a sensor configuration update to Windows systems.
That sensor configuration update caused the largest IT outage in history.
In this blog post, we examine the recent CrowdStrike outage and provide a technical overview of the root cause. We also explain why security products use kernel-mode drivers today and the safety measures Windows provides for third-party solutions. In addition, we share how customers and security vendors can better leverage the integrated security capabilities of Windows for increased security and reliability. Lastly, we provide a look into how Windows will enhance extensibility for future security products.
Shares of CrowdStrike plunged 13% on Monday, extending their loss-making streak, after Wall Street analysts downgraded the stock on concerns over the financial fallout from a global cyber outage last week.
On July 19, 2024 at 04:09 UTC, as part of ongoing operations, CrowdStrike released a sensor configuration update to Windows systems. Sensor configuration updates are an ongoing part of the protection mechanisms of the Falcon platform. This configuration update triggered a logic error resulting in a system crash and blue screen (BSOD) on impacted systems.
The sensor configuration update that caused the system crash was remediated on Friday, July 19, 2024 05:27 UTC.
This issue is not the result of or related to a cyberattack.
On July 18, CrowdStrike, an independent cybersecurity company, released a software update that began impacting IT systems globally. Although this was not a Microsoft incident, given it impacts our ecosystem, we want to provide an update on the steps we’ve taken with CrowdStrike and others to remediate and support our customers.
I want to sincerely apologize directly to all of you for today’s outage. All of CrowdStrike understands the gravity and impact of the situation. We quickly identified the issue and deployed a fix, allowing us to focus diligently on restoring customer systems as our highest priority.
The outage was caused by a defect found in a Falcon content update for Windows hosts. Mac and Linux hosts are not impacted. This was not a cyberattack.
On May 21, 2023, an online persona named spyboy began advertising an endpoint defense evasion tool for the Windows operating system via the Russian-language forum Ramp. The author claims that the software — seen in a demonstration video as being titled “Terminator” — can bypass twenty three (23) EDR and AV controls. At time of writing, spyboy is pricing the software from $300 USD (single bypass) to $3,000 USD (all-in-one bypass).
What Happened On March 29, 2023, Falcon OverWatch observed unexpected malicious activity emanating from a legitimate …