‘Tone deaf’: US tech company responsible for global IT outage to cut jobs and use AI
The cybersecurity company that became a household name after causing a massive global IT outage last year has announced it will cut 5% of its workforce in part due to “AI efficiency”,In a note to staff earlier this week, released in stock market filings in the US, CrowdStrike’s chief executive, George Kurtz, announced that 500 positions, or 5% of its workforce, would be cut globally, citing AI efficiencies created in the business,“We’re operating in a market and technology inflection point, with AI reshaping every industry, accelerating threats, and evolving customer needs,” he said,Kurtz said AI “flattens our hiring curve, and helps us innovate from idea to product faster”, adding it “drives efficiencies across both the front and back office”,“AI is a force multiplier throughout the business,” he said.
Other reasons for the cuts included market demand for sustained growth and expanding the product offering.The company expects to incur up to US$53m in costs as a result of the job cuts.CrowdStrike reported in March revenue of US$1bn for the fourth financial quarter of 2025, up 25% on the same quarter in 2024, with a loss of US$92m.In July last year, CrowdStrike pushed out a faulty update to its software designed to detect cybersecurity threats that brought down 8.5m Windows systems worldwide.
The outage caused chaos at airports, and took down computers in hospitals, TV networks, payment systems and people’s personal computers,Aaron McEwan, vice-president of research and advisory at consultancy Gartner, said he was sceptical when companies announced AI efficiencies close to reduced revenue forecasts, as CrowdStrike had in March,“I think particularly in the tech sector … it’s a way of justifying a reduction in the workforce because [of] a financial issue,” he said,“So either they’re not tracking well financially, or they’re trying to send a message to investors that good times are around the corner,So I’m immediately sceptical.
”McEwan said companies were facing pressure to deliver on the big investments made in AI,“The productivity gains that we expect to see from AI just aren’t flowing through,”Gartner research showed across workforces less than 50% of employees are using AI in their job, and only 8% of employees are using AI tools to improve productivity,Toby Walsh, professor of artificial intelligence at the University of New South Wales, said CrowdStrike’s announcement was “pretty tone deaf” after the outage last year,“They would have been better redeploying this 5% of people to emergency response and bug fixing,” he said.
Walsh said the market should expect more of these announcements in future.“It’s pretty simple: more profits for companies, less work for workers.But we should learn from the first Industrial Revolution.If we stand up in solidarity, we can use these savings to improve quality and quantity of work for all.”Niusha Shafiabady, associate professor in computational intelligence at the Australian Catholic University, said AI job replacements were an “unavoidable reality”.
“No matter what we believe is moral and right, this change will happen.Unfortunately, a lot of people will lose their traditional jobs to AI and technology,” she said.“If [companies] see that they are saving money by using AI and technology and enhancing their services, they will ask their employees to leave.This is the reality.”A World Economic Forum report in 2023 found nearly 23% of all jobs globally will change in the next five years due to AI and other macroeconomic trends.
While 69m jobs are expected to be created, 83m jobs could be eliminated, leading to a net decrease of 2%, Shafiabady said,McEwan said companies – tech companies in particular – would be looking for ways to use AI to reduce workforces over time,“I have no doubt that there will be the emergence of companies that are able to reduce their workforce and substantially because of AI,” he said,“It’ll depend on the type of product that they’re selling,But at the moment most companies would be wise to look at how they can use AI to augment their workforce rather than replace.
”Has your job been lost to AI? Get in touch – josh,taylor@theguardian,com
UK woman who took pills during lockdown cleared of illegal abortion
A woman has been cleared of illegally terminating a pregnancy, after taking abortion pills during lockdown.Nicola Packer took the pills at home in November 2020. She had been prescribed mifepristone and misoprostol after a remote consultation.She later delivered a foetus, which the court heard was estimated to be about 26 weeks in gestation, which she brought with her to Chelsea and Westminster hospital, Isleworth crown court heard.She was arrested in hospital and later charged with “unlawfully administering to herself a poison or other noxious thing” with the “intent to procure a miscarriage”
At least 216 children died in first high severity US flu season in seven years, CDC says
At least 216 children have died of influenza in the US during the last flu season in what the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said was classified as the first high severity season overall and for all age groups since 2017-2018.That number marks the highest pediatric death toll in 15 years; the previous high reported for a regular (non-pandemic) season was 236 pediatric deaths in the 2009-2010 season, according to the CDC. More recently, 207 pediatric deaths were reported during the 2023-2024 season.Based on data from FluSurv-NET, the cumulative hospitalization rate for this season is the highest observed since the 2010-2011 season. It estimates that there have been at least 47m illnesses, 610,000 hospitalizations and 26,000 deaths from flu so far this season
‘Utterly traumatised’: anger at ordeal of UK woman accused of illegal abortion
When Nicola Packer took a pregnancy test in November 2020, as the country was in lockdown during the coronavirus pandemic, she did not even believe she was pregnant.Aged 41 at the time, she thought it more likely that she was perimenopausal, but had been feeling under the weather and when her friend – with whom the pregnancy had been conceived – suggested she took a test, she only did so to “prove him wrong”.When the test, bought from a chemist around the corner, came back positive, she was “shocked”, but was never in any doubt about what to do. She had never wanted children, and immediately sought a termination.Under emergency provisions introduced during the pandemic – which were later made permanent – abortion pills could be dispatched by post, following a remote consultation, in pregnancies up to 10 weeks’ gestation
Gangs hold such influence over jails ‘it keeps me awake at night’, says Timpson
Organised criminal gangs who “corrupt” staff and enforce drug debts with violence hold such a huge influence over jails across England and Wales that it “keeps me awake at night”, the prisons minister has said.James Timpson told the Guardian that Prison Service staff who worked with criminal gangs to smuggle drugs and contraband into jails were being targeted by a “beefed up” counter-corruption unit that last year prosecuted 37 officers.His comments follow deepening concerns from prison watchdogs that criminal gangs are taking control of prisons – a claim Lord Timpson rejects. Criminologists have said the gangs are targeting and corrupting inexperienced officers.Timpson said in an interview: “Serious organised crime is a big problem, a huge problem, and it’s one of the things that keeps me awake at night, because of the impact it has on a prison’s environment, from drugs, debt, violence and everything that goes with that
‘It makes no sense’: Macmillan hiring for senior roles after axing 26% of staff
Macmillan Cancer Support has come under fire after launching a recruitment drive for a series of senior corporate roles just months after axing a quarter of its staff.The Guardian revealed in February that more than 400 workers had been let go as the charity reduced its workforce by 26%, downgraded its helpline and scrapped its 100-year-old hardship scheme that provided millions of pounds in grants to the poorest cancer patients.This week Macmillan told staff and partners it was making further cuts, scrapping its £14m-a-year welfare advice service. It will cease funding for hundreds of frontline advisers, employed by Citizens Advice, who help cancer patients navigate the benefits system and deal with the extra costs of their illness, such as food, heating and transport.The charity said in February it was making changes after feeling the impact of the “tough financial climate”
Cringe! How millennials became uncool
Her right to a naked ankle is, in the end, the hill Natalie Ormond is willing to die on. Ormond, a millennial, simply cannot – will not – get her head around gen Z’s fondness for a crew sock, pulled up over gym leggings or skimming bare legs, brazenly extending over the ankle towards the lower calf. “I stand by trainer socks and I won’t budge,” says the 43-year-old. “The more invisible the sock, the better.”A proclivity for socks hidden within low-top trainers is just one reason why millennials – anyone born between 1981-1996 – are now considered achingly uncool by the generation that came next: gen Z, AKA the zoomers, or zillennials
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