Over the past year multiple airlines have been hit by software breakdowns and cyberattacks that caused days of disruption.
In July 2023, a breakdown of the CrowdStrike platform, which many airlines use for their check-in processes, left gate agents with the so-called blue screen of death, referencing a system crash.
Delta Air Lines (DAL) was hit particularly hard and ended up launching a lawsuit against CrowdStrike over the $500 million in losses it suffered from canceled flights.
But while that outage occurred due to oversights rather than ill intent, a cyberattack on Seattle-Tacoma International Airport a month later was orchestrated by bad actors.
Along with sowing chaos on the system used to track passenger bags, a hacker gang known as Rhysida seized information about passengers and Alaska Airlines (ALK) executives and exposed it on the dark web. The hackers demanded a ransom of 100 bitcoin (then valued at some $6 million) to take down the data. Alaska Air refused the demand.
🎁 Buy 1 Year and Get 1 Year FREE on TheStreet Pro. Act now before it’s gone ⏰
Japan Air is latest carrier hit by cyberattack
The latest airline to get hit by a cyberattack is the flag carrier Japan Airlines (JPNRF) . The airline said that at about 7:30 a.m. Tokyo time Dec. 26 (5:30 p.m. U.S. EST Dec. 25) the network connecting its internal and external operating systems began showing signs of malfunction.
Kyodo News Service was first to report that Japan Airlines told the police that it suspected a distributed denial-of-service, or DDoS, attack and had to delay 60 domestic flights slated to depart on the morning of Dec. 26.
Some flights leaving in the early morning had to be canceled while the airline also suspended online purchases of new tickets for affected flights. Japan Post Co. said that mail and package deliveries were also affected.
Related: Hackers demand insane ransom from SeaTac Airport
The airline said the issue was resolved within 90 minutes with no leaked passenger data or permanent damage to its computer systems.
“The cause of the failure and the impact range of the system issues have been identified, and the system has been restored,” Japan Airlines said in a news release. “This failure is caused by receiving a large amount of data from an external source and there has been no customer data leakage or virus damage.”
Crowds of stranded travelers at Tokyo Haneda Airport
Canceled flights included morning routes from Tokyo to Izumo and Osaka and Fukuoka to Tokyo as well as one flight from Izumo back to Tokyo on Dec. 27.
Footage from Tokyo’s Haneda Airport showed crowds of travelers stranded during the busy holiday period. Some of the longest delays, four hours, affected flights that eventually took off in the afternoon.
More on travel:
U.S. government raises warnings for two popular vacation destinationsUnited Airlines to bring back route it hasn’t flown for five yearsIs another part of Mexico becoming ‘the next Tulum’?
At the same time, other Japanese airlines such as ANA Holdings (ALNPF) , All Nippon Airways, Skymark and Starflyer confirmed that they were not hit by a similar type of cyberattack.
While the issue was reported to be resolved by 2 p.m. local time, Japan’s chief cabinet secretary, Yoshimasa Hayashi, said at a news conference that “through the Transport Ministry we have requested JAL to repair its system as soon as possible to respond appropriately to affected customers.”
Related: Veteran fund manager sees world of pain coming for stocks
