An Atlanta judge has ruled that a multi-million dollar lawsuit from Delta Air Lines against CrowdStrike for last summer’s software meltdown can proceed. Meanwhile, Delta faces a class action lawsuit of its own from disgruntled passengers over the meltdown.

Delta Air Lines Can Proceed With Lawsuit Against CrowdStrike

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Kelly Lee Ellerbe has allowed Delta to attempt to prove that CrowdStrike was grossly negligent in pushing a negligently defective update of its Falcon software to customers, which crashed computer systems around the world and led to a multi-day operational meltdown impacting millions of Delta passengers. 7,000 flights were ultimately cancelled. Delta said the outage cost the company $500 million ($550 million in lost revenue and added expenses but $50 million in fuel savings while thousands of flights were grounded).

Judge Ellerbe wrote:

“Delta has specifically pled that if CrowdStrike had tested the July update on one computer before its deployment, the programming error would have been detected. As CrowdStrike has acknowledged, its own president publicly stated CrowdStrike did something ‘horribly wrong.’”

Delta may also pursue a trespass claim and attempt to prove that CrowdStrike had access to Delta systems via “unauthorized back door” per the terms of their contract.

But CrowdStrike has countersued Delta, alleging that Delta refused assistance from its expert technicians that could have greatly reduced the meltdown (and implied that the main issue was not CrowdStrike but antiquated legacy systems that did not even use CrowdStrike technology). Shortly after the incident, Delta said it would not trust someone who broke the system to fix it and asserted that CrowdStrike was objectively the proximate cause for its meltdown. CrowdStrike also argues that damages are capped in the “single-digit millions of dollars” by Georgia law.

Delta Being Sued By Customers Over Refunds

In addition to the countersuit by CrowdStrike, another judge has held that a class action lawsuit against Delta Air Lines can proceed from aggrieved customers who assert that Delta unlawfully and unreasonably withheld refunds.

Delta was initially reluctant to book passengers on other carriers or offer assistance for hotel and meal expenses, though it finally caved in on the third day of the meltdown.

> Read More: Delta Air Lines Offers Olive Branch To Stranded Passengers, But It Must Do More To Take Accountability For Meltdown
> Read More: New Class Action Lawsuit Filed By Delta Air Lines Passengers Exposes The Delta Between Promises Made And Promises Kept

CONCLUSION

Delta’s lawsuit against CrowdStrike will proceed. We do not have access (yet) to the contract between the two companies, but a judge has allowed Delta to make the case that its meltdown can be fully blamed on CrowdStrike. Meanwhile, CrowdStrike is countersuing, arguing it is being scapegoated by Delta for antiquated systems. Delta also faces a class action lawsuit from consumers over delayed refunds stemming from the meltdown.

image: Delta