CrowdStrike explains a catastrophic flaw that caused a global tech meltdown last week

The botched CrowdStrike software update that caused a global computer meltdown last week was sent because of a flaw in its quality control system — the tool meant to prevent such errors from happening in the first place, admitted the cyber security giant on Wednesday.

Airlines, hospitals, banks and various other businesses were crippled last Friday as a result of the catastrophic software update that left millions of Microsoft Windows-powered PCs facing the dreaded “blue screen of death”.

CrowdStrike said the update was released as a routine step in its rapid response plan, which aims to update cybersecurity systems to combat new threats.

However, the firm’s “content validator” tool, which scans updates to make sure they’re stable, doesn’t work well.

As a result, the faulty update “passed validation despite containing problematic content data,” CrowdStrike said in an extensive report detailing what led to the meltdown.

The fallout was still being felt this week as thousands of Delta Air Lines passengers were stranded at airports as more than 4,000 flights were canceled since last Friday.

Microsoft said it estimated 8.5 million devices were affected by the flaw, which is less than 1 percent of Windows PCs worldwide.

CrowdStrike said it was implementing a new process “to protect against this type of problematic content from being deployed in the future.”

CrowdStrike’s stock fell more than 30% after the incident, wiping out billions of dollars in value for the company.

Despite the crisis, CrowdStrike stock is still in positive territory since the beginning of the year.

Wedbush analyst Dan Ives described the situation as a “huge black eye” for CrowdStrike, which is one of the world’s largest IT firms.

House lawmakers have asked the company’s CEO George Kurtz to testify about the incident and CrowdStrike’s efforts to avoid similar meltdowns in the future.

Elsewhere, CrowdStrike chief security officer Shawn Henry said the company was “devastated” that its bug had caused so much trouble for customers.

“The trust we built in bits and pieces over the years was lost in buckets in a matter of hours and it was a crushing blow,” Henry wrote in a LinkedIn post.