CrowdStrike CEO Urged to Testify

Republican representatives have formally requested CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz to testify before the House Committee on Homeland Security following a significant software update failure that affected millions of Microsoft Windows devices. In a letter issued on Monday, Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn., and Rep. Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y., highlighted the incident as a critical warning regarding the national security risks tied to network dependency. The software glitch led to widespread disruptions across essential sectors of the global economy, including banking, aviation, healthcare, and emergency services. The outage resulted in thousands of flight delays and cancellations across the U.S., while numerous healthcare facilities were forced to reschedule non-emergency appointments. The fallout from the incident was reflected in the stock market, with CrowdStrike shares plummeting over 13% on the same day. A spokesperson for CrowdStrike confirmed that the company is in communication with relevant Congressional Committees, indicating that further briefings may be scheduled at the discretion of the members involved. Despite the chaos, Kurtz asserted that the outage was neither a cyberattack nor a security breach, and a fix was implemented on the same day. However, Green and Garbarino emphasized the necessity for a thorough investigation into the incident to prevent future occurrences. They have requested that CrowdStrike arrange a hearing with the Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection by Wednesday at the latest to address the implications of the software failure.