A computer virus shut down the U.S. Customs computer system for several hours Thursday which are used to process international flight arriving passengers.
Airports affected included those in New York, San Francisco, Miami, Los Angeles, Houston, Dallas and Laredo, Texas, reported Homeland Security, leaving long lines of frustrated travelers.
Miami International Airport experienced the worst delays with up to 2,000 people delayed in clearing immigration.
New York airports’ customs officials manually processed passengers during the shutdown. Los Angeles was able to activate backup systems to process arriving passengers.
While Homeland Security declined to discuss details on the origin of the virus, it is believed it is the same computer worm which on Tuesday attacked computer systems using Microsoft operating systems, shutting down computers in the United States, Germany and Asia.
