Optus admits four people died during tech failure disruption of emergency calls

Optus, the second largest Australian mobile network, admitted that four people have died during the company’s network outage on Thursday that lasted 13 hours.

A network upgrade at Optus resulted in a technical failure that affected its triple-0 calls across South Australia, the Northern Territory, and Western Australia, according to CEO Stephen Rue. He further confirmed that approximately 600 customers were potentially impacted.

“I have been advised that during the process of conducting welfare checks, three of the triple-0 calls involved households where a person tragically passed away,” Rue told a press conference.

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