Dexcom's chief technology officer told CNBC the company knew its continuous blood sugar monitors — used by diabetic patients to track their blood sugar levels — weren't sending users alerts right away when the company experienced a service outage over the weekend, but was "ill-equipped" to alert users.
Around midnight Eastern time on Nov. 29, Dexcom suffered a service outage that stopped the devices from alerting users if their blood sugar was reaching dangerous levels. The company didn't alert users of the outage until about 11 a.m., and parents who use Dexcom's device to track their diabetic children's blood sugar levels were not informed that they wouldn't be receiving the alerts.
The messaging feature on Dexcom's app, where users get their blood sugar information, is unable to message customers in real time if there's an issue with the system, Dexcom CTO Jake Leach told CNBC, but the company is working to fix that, he said.
The company relies on users to check its Facebook page to be notified of any system problems, Mr. Leach said.
Mr. Leach told CNBC the outage was a "complete surprise" because the company did not have any scheduled updates to the system when the outage occurred. He said Dexcom was aware immediately that there was an issue affecting the monitors, but it didn't know how widespread the issue was.
Dexcom had its internal engineers working on the problem and recruited help from the company's partners. It found no evidence of a data breach, Mr. Leach said.
As of Dec. 2, the outage was mostly repaired, but the system was not entirely functional, according to CNBC.
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