Telecom giant AT&T suffered a significant setback on Thursday when a widespread network outage swept across the United States, disrupting essential services for countless customers.
Users reported difficulties making calls, sending texts, and accessing the internet, causing frustration and inconvenience.
The outage, which lasted about 11 hours, affected AT&T customers across the country. Many users took to social media to air their grievances, with reports from various regions detailing the scope of the disruption.
AT&T quickly acknowledged the problem, attributing it to an incorrect procedure used during network expansion and ruling out the possibility of a cyberattack.
A visitor walks past US multinational telecommunications AT&T logo at the Mobile World Congress (MWC), the telecom industry's biggest annual gathering, in Barcelona on February 27, 2023.
In response to the disruption, AT&T announced plans to reimburse affected customers through billing credits. As reported by Reuters, these credits are intended to cover the average cost of a full day of wireless service, recognizing the inconvenience subscribers experienced during the outage. "We recognize the frustration this outage has caused and know we let many of our customers down," the company said in a statement. "We're also taking steps to prevent this from happening again in the future." The company apologized for the disruption and assured customers that steps would be taken to avoid similar incidents in the future. Estimates suggest that the recent outage affected around 290 million people across the United States using AT&T 5G network. Despite the disruption, AT&T reported that service had been fully restored to all affected customers by late afternoon on Thursday. One AT&T subscriber posted on X early Saturday that she had already been refunded $52.50 due to the outage. "I contacted them online and just asked for a credit for the outage, within minutes they gave me a $52.50 credit toward my next bill," the user said. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the United States Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) are actively investigating the outage. While the definitive cause is still being investigated, regulators are working closely with AT&T to identify the source of the problem and ensure preventive measures are implemented. This incident is similar to a previous outage experienced by T-Mobile that resulted in a $19.5 million settlement with regulators. Furthermore, nearly 4 million AT&T customers have experienced "throttling" in 2014, resulting in a lawsuit. Affected users were able to claim their share of AT&T's previous $60 million settlement agreement with the US Federal Trade Commission, which expired in May 2023. The recent outage posed life-threatening risks by limiting users' access to emergency services, potentially delaying critical assistance. "If you were in an area where Wi-Fi was unavailable, and/or if unfamiliar with how to hop onto Wi-Fi, [the outage was] very troubling," Syracuse University Professor Lee McKnight told Tech Times in an interview. With the increased reliance on mobile communication, prolonged outages become dangerous, especially when combined with an inability to contact emergency services. This highlights the urgent need for users to be prepared for such situations and the importance of alternative communication methods and emergency protocols to reduce risks during future outages. Stay posted here at Tech Times. Related Article: AT&T's Recent Cell Phone Service Outage Was Scary - But It Could Get WorseAT&T to Reimburse Customers Affected by Outage
Investigations Underway
Impact of the Outage
