Modernizing the IT Backbone Behind 62 Million JFK Passengers
Airfield operations, security checkpoints and parking revenue all run on the same backbone. It had to be brought to current security standards without interrupting any of them.
Port Authority of New York & New Jersey · John F. Kennedy International Airport
The challenge
JFK’s IT infrastructure carries close to 62 million passengers a year, and the systems riding on it — security screening, baggage handling, airfield operations, parking revenue — have no tolerance for downtime. An outage is not an inconvenience; it is a public safety and national-connectivity problem.
Parts of that backbone were running end-of-life equipment and code that no longer met current cybersecurity standards, which had to be addressed on a live network serving a continuously operating international airport.
What we did
BlackHawk Data maintained and upgraded the network backbone supporting airfield operations, security checkpoints, parking revenue and the other critical systems, drawing on more than 15 years of aviation project experience.
The work centred on code and end-of-life equipment updates that brought the environment in line with current cybersecurity standards, done in a way that preserved the resilience and availability of operational systems throughout.
Outcomes
- ~62M — annual passengers supported by the modernised backbone
- Zero tolerance — downtime requirement met across all airport subsystems
- Current standards — end-of-life equipment and code brought up to date
- 15+ years — of aviation project experience applied