There was widespread disruption at US airports after the latest in a series of aviation related computer outages yesterday.
Although brief, it was potentially the most damaging yet, crashing the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s ait travel system which checks watch lists for potential terrorist threats.
The outage lasted about 90 minutes but hacking was not thought to be the cause of the systems crash, the agency said.
"At this time, there is no indication the service disruption was malicious in nature," a spokesman said.
US Customs and Border Protection confirmed there were delays at US ports of entry.
New York JFK, Boston and Dallas-Fort Worth were among the airports where long lines quickly developed of arriving passengers waiting for customs and immigration clearance while departing passengers were also held up.
A CBP statement said it processed international travelers using ‘alternative procedures’ during the outage.
Additionally, a Homeland Security official said passengers were ‘manually vetted against the watch list’ at New York JFK which is thought to have suffered the worst disruption.
