Optus Slammed After Outage Linked to Three Deaths in Australia
Australia is reeling after a major Optus network outage left people unable to reach emergency services — a failure now tied to the deaths of three people.
What Happened
The outage struck around midnight on Thursday and lasted 13 hours, affecting more than 600 people across South Australia, Western Australia, and the Northern Territory.
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Victims include an eight-week-old baby and a 68-year-old woman in South Australia.
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A third death was reported in Western Australia.
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Authorities weren’t told about the outage — or the fatalities — until late Friday.
Government Reaction
Australia’s Communications Minister Anika Wells didn’t hold back:
“Optus let Australians down when they needed them the most — and this isn’t good enough.”
Wells stressed that under Australian law, telcos must guarantee access to emergency services. She added that it was unacceptable Optus had no clear answers 24 hours after the failure and confirmed that the communications watchdog is investigating.
What Optus Said
Optus CEO Stephen Rue explained the outage happened during a routine firewall update.
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“Initial testing didn’t indicate any issue with emergency calls,” Rue said.
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He admitted no alarms went off to flag the problem.
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Optus only became aware of the scale of the outage on Friday afternoon, halting the update and restoring calls.
Calling the deaths “absolutely tragic,” Rue said welfare checks were carried out for affected customers and promised an independent investigation.
The Bigger Picture
This isn’t Optus’ first crisis. In 2023, the telco was fined AUS $12 million after another outage knocked out its mobile and internet services for almost 12 hours.
Now, with three lives lost, Optus could face even heavier fines and legal penalties.
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