Written by staff writer.
The CEO of Optus has denied claims that a major network upgrade was responsible for a daylong nationwide outage on Wednesday, November 8, 2023.
Optus went dark around 4.00 a.m. (Australian Eastern time), cutting landline, mobile, and internet connections for ten million plus users, including Metro, the operator of Melbourne’s rail network, who shut down their system, while thousands of small businesses could not use their mobile payment terminals.
The timing of the outage and early statements from CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin saying it was unlikely the result of a cyberattack led to assumptions later in the day, picked up by media outlets, that the outage resulted from a network upgrade.
“I can tell you that is not true,” Bayer Rosmarin said Wednesday evening. “What I can say is it is a very technical network engineering issue.”
By Wednesday evening, Bayer Rosmarin said Optus had fully restored its network. However, social media platforms updated with customer comments well into the evening, saying there were still problems in their area.
Bayer Rosmarin faced criticism throughout the day for not providing more information on the reason for the outage, the most disruptive telco blackout since the infamous Vodafone outages around a decade ago. However, while Optus adopted a cautious tone in their public announcements during the outage, they did tell wholesale customers earlier in the day that they were trying to identify faults with routers and router reflectors. However, they were also having difficultly accessing parts of the network using remote tools.
Rachel Falk, Chief Executive Officer of the Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre and a former General Manager of Cybersecurity at Telstra, told the ABC on Wednesday evening that telcos like Optus typically have inbuilt redundancy to cover problems that may arise during outages or upgrades. “For whatever reason, that redundancy and backup failed today, and we await the root cause analysis from Optus.”
Falk pointed out that most Optus employees, including their engineering and field workers, were also likely relying on the Optus network. “If you cannot communicate with each other internally, I imagine that would have caused a bit of a problem.” Later in the day, it emerged that Bayer Rosmarin was using WhatsApp and non-Optus WiFi networks to liaise with selected media outlets.
Falk also squashed claims Optus could have asked competitors like Telstra to let Optus customers piggyback off their network for the outage’s duration. “The only thing they do transfer is the interoperability of 000 calls on mobile services. Network camping does go on, but they cannot just reroute. They are different systems and different companies.”
Falk added that Wednesday’s outage demonstrated the fragility of our communications systems and the high levels of reliance we place on them. “We can’t go backwards on the reliance, but we can better understand the fragility of the telco network. Twelve hours is a long time to be without crucial services.”
Last year, Optus and Bayer Rosmarin faced fierce criticism after a cyberattack resulted in the theft of the primary identification details of millions of current and past customers. Following that incident, Optus promised greater transparency in the future.