SYDNEY (AFP) – The Australian government said yesterday that telco firm Optus “let Australians down” after three people died during a network outage that prevented calls to emergency services.

The outage impacted 600 people across South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory shortly after midnight on Thursday evening for 13 hours. Authorities said they were not informed of the incident or deaths until late Friday.

Communications Minister Anika Wells said yesterday the telco company had “let Australians down when they needed them the most and this isn’t good enough”.

“Optus and all telecommunications providers have obligations under Australian law to ensure that they enable emergency services’ calls.” Wells added it was “not good enough” that Optus did not appear to know enough about why the failure occurred and why alarms did not go off 24 hours after the outage.

Wells said an investigation by the communications watchdog was underway. South Australian Police said the deaths of an eight-week-old boy and a 68-year-old woman were linked to the outage.

The third death occurred in Western Australia, local media reported. Optus Chief Executive Stephen Rue said the outage occurred during a regular firewall update. “Initial testing and monitoring did not indicate there were any issues with calls connecting,” he said yesterday.

“There were no alarms to alert us that some emergency calls were not making it through.”

Optus was made aware of the outage shortly after midday on Friday and stopped the upgrade, restoring calls to emergency services. He said the three deaths were “absolutely tragic”.

Rue added welfare checks had been carried out on all impacted customers and he was not aware of any further deaths. Optus will conduct an independent investigation into the matter.

The telco could face fines and other legal penalties.

Optus was previously fined AUD12 million after an outage halted its mobile and internet systems for nearly 12 hours in 2023.

-- Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin