Crowdstrike may lose $16 billion- a fifth of its value- amid global IT outage
Crowdstrike CEO confirms issue caused by antivirus software interaction, not a cyberattack. Mac and Linux not affected, fix deployed.
Shares of cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike- which is behind global Microsoft outage- lost a fifth of its value in trading in the US and was down 21% in unofficial trading. This would result in a loss of almost $16 billion in Crowdstrike's valuation after the company was involved in a massive IT outage hitting companies and airports worldwide.
Read more: Microsoft users unable to access apps and services amid outage: What's working, what's not
According to Oleg Gorokhovsky, founder of the Ukrainian online bank Monobank, the outage resulted from "an interaction between the CrowdStrike antivirus" software and the Windows operating system of Microsoft. Crowdstrike CEO George Kurtz said that the company “is actively working with customers impacted by a defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts.”
Read more: Crowdstrike says global Microsoft outage caused by 'defect' in 'content update'
He added, "Mac and Linux hosts are not impacted. This is not a security incident or cyberattack. The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed. We refer customers to the support portal for the latest updates and will continue to provide complete and continuous updates on our website.”
Read more: Microsoft on global outage: Anticipate a resolution is forthcoming
Microsoft also reacted to the tech glitch and said a resolution for Windows devices is “forthcoming” while blaming a third party. The company said, "We are aware of an issue affecting Windows devices due to an update from a third party software platform. We anticipate a resolution is forthcoming."