As Delta Air Lines claimed the CrowdStrike global IT outage cost the airline $500 million, CrowdStrike is claiming it reached out to help Delta, to which the airline did not answer.
Last week, Delta CEO Ed Bastian said the global outage, which was caused by a failed software update, cost the airline $100 million per day. Now, while Delta is threatening legal action, CrowdStrike is striking back, saying Delta did not take offers to help.
Bastian previously said CrowdStrike was not around during the outage.
“They haven’t offered us anything,” Bastian said. “Free consulting advice to help us.”
CrowdStrike attorney Michael Carlinsky said Delta’s public threat of litigation “contributed to a misleading narrative that CrowdStrike is responsible for Delta’s IT decisions and response to the outage.”
“Should Delta pursue this path, Delta will have to explain to the public, its shareholders, and ultimately a jury why CrowdStrike took responsibility for its actions—swiftly, transparently, and constructively—while Delta did not,” Carlinsky wrote in a letter to Delta’s legal counsel.
Bastian previously blasted the IT company for the outage, telling CNBC’s Squawkbox, “If you’re going to be having access, priority access to the Delta ecosystem in terms of technology, you’ve got to test the stuff. You can’t come into a mission-critical 24/7 operation and tell us we have a bug.”
Delta has “no choice” but to pursue legal action against CrowdStrike, Bastian said.
“We have to protect our shareholders,” he said. “We have to protect our customers, our employees, for the damage, not just to the cost of it, but to the brand, the reputational damage.”
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Carlinsky said CrowdStrike was “highly disappointed by Delta’s suggestion that CrowdStrike acted inappropriately and strongly rejects any allegation that it was grossly negligent or committed willful misconduct.”
According to CNN, CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz personally offered onsite assistance to Bastian during the outage but did not receive a response. Delta later told CrowdStrike that help was not needed during the airline’s five-day stretch of service outages that resulted in thousands of canceled flights.
