22.09.2025 13:23
The outage at telecommunications giant Optus plunged Australia into chaos. Hundreds of citizens were unable to call emergency services for 13 hours, and as a result of the disruption, three people lost their lives.
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Australian authorities announced that telecommunications giant Optus will face "significant consequences" due to a system outage linked to multiple deaths.
Hundreds of people living in more than half of the country were unable to call emergency services for 13 hours. Optus, one of the country's two major providers, reported that at least three people died as a result of this situation. The company's CEO apologized to families and the public, describing the incident as "completely unacceptable."
DELAYED NOTIFICATION SPARKED REACTIONS
The company waited 40 hours to announce the incident and only informed regulatory bodies after the issue was resolved. This was deemed a violation of standards by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). During the outage on Thursday, more than 600 emergency calls failed. Most of the calls came from South Australia, Western Australia, and the Northern Territory. Two calls from the southwest of New South Wales also failed to connect to the Triple-0 line.
CEO RUE: WE ARE VERY SORRY
Optus CEO Stephen Rue stated that the outage was caused by a technical error during a network upgrade. After services resumed, checks confirmed that three people had died. One of them was a baby, but police stated that the likelihood of the death being connected to the network outage was low. Western Australian authorities also indicated that they believed another person died due to a failed call.
"NECESSARY STEPS WILL BE TAKEN"
In a statement on Sunday, Rue said: "I want to reiterate how sorry I am for the loss of four people who were unable to reach emergency services when they needed urgent help. Necessary steps are being taken and will be taken to ensure that such an incident does not happen again."
The authority found that in 2023, Optus failed to provide emergency call services to 2,145 people and did not follow up with 369 individuals affected by the incident. As a result, the company paid more than 12 million Australian dollars (8 million US dollars) in fines.
"OPTUS HAS COMMITTED A HUGE FAILURE"
Communications Minister Anika Wells stated that telecommunications providers "have no excuse" for Triple-0 call failures. Wells mentioned that she spoke with Rue and that the Prime Minister suggested the CEO should consider resigning.
"I expressed how incredibly disappointed I am that we have come to this point again – especially in such a short time. We should never have reached this point. Optus has committed a huge failure against the Australian public, and there will be significant consequences."
As investigations continue, Rue announced that he would provide daily updates to the public as new information emerges.
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