KUALA LUMPUR, July 21 — A recent global IT outage caused airlines to lose millions in revenue and created chaos due to system failures, said Capital A Bhd chief executive officer Tan Sri Tony Fernandes.
Fernandes acknowledged CrowdStrike’s apology but emphasised airlines are still waiting for an explanation from Microsoft about the incident.
“Tech companies have little empathy. What we went through with Covid-19, they had no sympathy. Now they have issues and expect us all to understand. Well, I’m not going to. Airlines need answers and compensation,” he said in a LinkedIn post today.
CrowdStrike Holdings Inc, an American cybersecurity technology company based in Austin, Texas, provides endpoint protection, threat intelligence and cyberattack response services.
Despite the chaos, Fernandes highlighted the importance of learning and growing from the situation.
He said the situation seems to have stabilised on the second day of the global IT outage affecting AirAsia’s operations at Kuala Lumpur International Airport Terminal 2.
“But we are not letting our guard down. We stand ready for any further disruption,” he said.
Fernandes said the airline has been managing operations manually, including check-ins, printing boarding passes and baggage drop-offs, with over 100 Allstar volunteers assisting on the ground.
“This reminds me of our early days 23 years ago when everything was done manually. We are proud that we have minimised flight cancellations due to our agility in switching to manual operations and our sincere commitment to serve the people,” he added.
On Friday, major institutions, including airlines, banks, media channels and hospitals in several countries, were affected by the global IT outage linked to CrowdStrike.
— Bernama
