Faulty security update affected computers worldwide
When cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike pushed out a faulty global software update in the middle of the night on July 19, 2024, LHRIC staff were alerted and went into response mode long before most school district personnel were even awake.
By 9 a.m., an emergency response team of network and systems engineers had brought 95% of district servers back online and restored all centrally hosted LHRIC services. What was a historic IT outage, quickly became a problem solved for districts that rely on the LHRIC for server hosting and support. CrowdStrike is used to secure all LHRIC-managed devices.
“We all took steps to solve the problem and promptly communicate the solution to our district partners,” LHRIC Executive Director, Dr. Ellen J. McDonnell, said. ”Our districts were very pleased with our response, as was I.”
John DiChiara, Coordinator of Network Support, led the response team, which worked through the early morning hours to restore affected servers. The team included Systems Engineer Cara Posner, who was the first to be alerted of the incident at around 1:30 a.m., along with Systems Engineer Will Pritz, Network Administrators Sony Vadakel and Randy Santos, and WAN Specialist William Mahood.
Tim Facchin, Manager of Education Technology at Byram Hills, credited his district’s smooth recovery from the incident to the quick efforts of the LHRIC Team. “Thanks to everyone's early morning efforts on what was surely a hard day, all of our servers were back up in the morning before we were,” Mr. Facchin said.