An attempt by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike to thank workers tackling the recent global IT outage with a $10 UberEats voucher hit a snag after Uber flagged the gesture as potential fraud.
CrowdStrike confirmed it sent the $10 voucher to “teammates and partners” who helped customers affected by a faulty software update it issued.
The outage paralyzed 8.5 million devices worldwide and caused chaos at airports, cancellations of hospital appointments and blackouts of television channels.
Tech news website TechCrunch reported that some recipients encountered an error message when trying to use their voucher, saying that they had been cancelled by the issuing party and were no longer valid.
A CrowdStrike spokesperson said Uber had blocked the cards after high usage rates triggered a fraud alert.
“CrowdStrike did not send gift cards to customers,” the spokesperson said. “We did send them to our teammates and partners who have been helping customers through this situation. Uber flagged this as fraud due to the high usage rates.”
In the email issuing the voucher, TechCrunch reports, CrowdStrike said: “We recognize the additional work that the July 19 incident has caused. And for that, we send our sincere thanks and apologies for the inconvenience.”
On Wednesday, one insurer estimated that the botched upgrade would cost US Fortune 500 companies $5.4 billion, with banking, airline and healthcare companies among the hardest hit.
CrowdStrike added in a blog post Wednesday that the root cause of the breach was a bug in an update CrowdStrike pushed to its Falcon product, which is supposed to protect businesses from cyberattacks.
CrowdStrike also outlined steps it would take to prevent this from happening again, including staggering the rollout of updates, giving customers more control over when and where they occur, and providing more details about planned updates.
Air France KLM said on Thursday it expected damages of around 10 million euros from the incident. US-based Delta Air Lines appeared to be the worst hit carrier, having cancelled more than 6,000 flights since Friday, prompting the US Department of Transport to open an investigation “to ensure that the rights of Delta passengers are respected”.
