IT disruptions recently affected two airlines within the oneworld Alliance, leading to numerous flight delays and cancellations. On December 24, American Airlines experienced significant operational issues that resulted in a grounding of flights for up to one hour. This disruption occurred during one of the busiest travel days of the year, as American requested a nationwide ground stop from the FAA due to a "vendor technology issue." The technical problems were linked to networking equipment managed by DXC Technologies, though neither American Airlines nor DXC provided immediate commentary on the situation.
Meanwhile, Japan Airlines (JAL) faced its challenges on December 26 when network equipment connecting its internal and external systems failed after experiencing an overload of data from an external source. This incident prompted suspicions of a potential distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack. JAL stated that the problem was diagnosed, the systems were restored, and it registered no data leaks or compromising of customer information. Nonetheless, the airline was forced to suspend several services temporarily, limiting last-minute upgrades and standby seat access. As a result of the disruptions, 71 JAL flights were delayed, some by over four hours, while four flights were canceled.
These incidents, while significant, paled in comparison to previous large-scale operational failures in the airline industry, such as those experienced by Southwest Airlines, which resulted in thousands of canceled flights in late 2022 due to IT system collapses triggered by severe weather.
For further details on DDoS attacks, see CSO’s definition of DDoS attacks.
