SkyWest Airlines filed a civil lawsuit against two of its former pilots late last month, alleging they accessed confidential employee records without authorization and obtained personal information of thousands of coworkers. The complaint was filed Jan. 30 in U.S. District Court in Utah and accuses Daniel Moussaron and Vikaas Krithivas of violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, breaching contract terms and engaging in civil conspiracy. The airline alleges the pilots accessed addresses and personal phone numbers through the company’s SkyWest Online portal over the course of several months during 2025.
The complaint said company IT logs show Moussaron first accessed the company’s pilot data beginning on Aug. 29, 2025, and did so again on multiple occasions. It also alleges Krithivas accessed and downloaded records for thousands of pilots beginning in September, with the two men described in the complaint as working sequentially through the directory. SkyWest claims pilots later received mass messages on personal phones unrelated to company operations. The airline is seeking damages and a jury trial.
In court filings, both men deny wrongdoing and say the activity was tied to union organizing efforts. Moussaron stated he used standard browser developer tools in order to access information available through systems tied to his login credentials, and that he did not bypass security controls. Krithivas has said the information was being gathered to support an effort to organize SkyWest pilots.
An attorney for Moussaron told PEOPLE the conduct was “union organizing activity that’s protected under The Railway Labor Act,” adding that the pilot “didn’t hack their system” and accessed information available through the company directory.
The pilots named in the suit dispute SkyWest’s characterization of their efforts as hacking, arguing in their own filings and public statements that the data was accessible through the company’s existing internal systems. They have characterized the lawsuit as a labor dispute tied to organizing activity and maintain that there was no intent to harm coworkers or misuse personal data.
Neither pilot has been criminally charged, and the matter remains a civil case.
0 replies