One of the country’s largest telecommunications networks is experiencing a massive nationwide outage on mobile and broadband devices.
With banks, hospitals, and businesses affected, the blackout has struck millions of Optus customers.
Optus users began reporting outages at 4:05 am on Wednesday morning.
Users on both mobile, landline and broadband networks were hit by the outage.
Customers have been unable to make calls or access mobile data since about 4am this morning.
Optus Mobile customers are reporting their phones showing SOS on the signal indicator, which is a sign that your regular network is down, but that your phone has access to alternate networks in the event of an emergency call.
The shutdown is the longest, and largest in recent memory.
When will Optus be back?
Optus has not yet brought the network back online.
The network has messaged concerned customers, stating”we’re aware of an issue impacting connections for some Optus customers,” it said.
“We understand connectivity is important and are working to restore services as a priority.”
“We apologise for any inconvenience caused while we have the issue resolved.”
At the time of writing, the network had been experiencing an outage for 7 hours.
What caused the Optus outage?
Optus has not yet confirmed the cause of the nationwide outage.
The Optus website says engineers are investigating a network fault.
Communications Minister Michelle Rowland told the media this morning that a “a deep fault” had occurred deep within the Optus network.
“It has wide ramifications across mobile, fixed, and broadband services for Optus customers,” she said.
She said a “fault in the core network” was affecting their routing, electronics, and other functions that are fundamental to the network.
Optus was hacked in October 2022, leaving millions of customer’s data exposed.
Are network outages common?
Telstra experienced an hours-long outage in May 2023 that left customers unable to make or receive calls.
The network outage took place overnight on the 9th of May and was resolved by 9am the next day.
Vodafone experienced an hours-long 4G delay in April 2021.
