Austin, Texas - CrowdStrike, a leading cybersecurity company, has announced that it has activated "Three-Day Weekend" mode for all Windows machines around the globe. The new feature, which is part of the company's Falcon platform, will allow Windows machines to automatically shut down and enter a secure state every Friday at 5:00 AM local time, and will remain in this state until Monday at 8:00 AM local time.
The move comes in response to the increasing number of cyberattacks that occur over the weekend, when many organizations are understaffed and less able to respond to security incidents. By automatically shutting down Windows machines over the weekend, CrowdStrike hopes to reduce the risk of cyberattacks and data breaches.
"Three-Day Weekend mode is a game-changer for cybersecurity," said George Kurtz, CEO and co-founder of CrowdStrike. "By automatically shutting down Windows machines in advance of the weekend, we can significantly reduce the attack surface and make it much harder for cybercriminals to gain access to sensitive data. We also think this might encourage the bad guys to take a break and re-think their lives, you know?"
When asked about the potential impact on productivity, Kurtz said that the benefits of increased security far outweigh any temporary loss of productivity. "The reality is that most organizations are not actively using their Windows machines over the weekend, so the impact on productivity should be minimal. No one can get phished if they're not able to log into their work email, right?" he said. He also pointed to the people dancing in the streets and strolling arm in arm singing "Teams is down, but we're safe and sound! Teams is down, we're homeward bound!" as evidence of the positive impact of the new feature.
At time of writing, major airports around the world had cancelled flights and mission control at NASA had been shut down due to the new feature. The FAA has issued a statement saying that they are working with CrowdStrike to resolve the issue and get flights back in the air as soon as possible.