WASHINGTON, July 22 (Reuters) - The U.S. House of

Representatives Homeland Security Committee has sent a letter to

CrowdStrike ( CRWD ) CEO George Kurtz asking him to testify on

last week's global tech outage.

WHY IT'S IMPORTANT

CrowdStrike's ( CRWD ) glitchy update to its security software

crashed computers powered by Microsoft's ( MSFT ) Windows

operating system on Friday, disrupting internet services across

the globe and affecting a broad swath of industries including

airlines, banking and healthcare. Microsoft ( MSFT ) said on Saturday

about 8.5 million Windows devices were affected.

Services across industries gradually came back online later

on Friday but companies were dealing with backlogs, delays,

canceled flights and other issues, raising questions on how to

avoid such a situation in the future and whether such critical

software should remain in the hands of a few companies.

KEY QUOTES

"While we appreciate CrowdStrike's ( CRWD ) response and coordination

with stakeholders, we cannot ignore the magnitude of this

incident, which some have claimed is the largest IT outage in

history," the congressional panel wrote in its letter to Kurtz

dated Monday. The letter was reported first by the Washington

Post.

"CrowdStrike ( CRWD ) is actively in contact with relevant

Congressional Committees. Briefings and other engagement

timelines may be disclosed at members' discretion," a company

spokesperson said.

WHAT'S NEXT

The letter urges the CEO to schedule a hearing with a

subcommittee of the panel - the Subcommittee on Cybersecurity

and Infrastructure Protection - by Wednesday.