Anyone having issues right now ?
Says emergency calls only for me
Optus Mobile Network down Right Now ?
snappy1234 on 08/11/2023 - 05:16
Last edited 08/11/2023 - 05:17
Last edited 08/11/2023 - 05:17
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I'm on Coles mobile
Down, down, network is down… ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬
Me too. Just activated mine last week. Still says "Maintenance Mode".
clearing my bank accounts
WIP
Maybe they hijacked all Optus numbers and are clearing all related bank accounts with the data they've previously stolen?
That'd be a problem…
Second factor authentication is not very safe anymore considering what's happened. We probably need 3 or 4 factor authentication for bank accounts these days.
Second factor authentication is fine, what's problematic is SMS being the method of authentication (and in a lot of cases password is no longer required making it effectively the only factor authentication). Device bound authentication method (eg Google authenticator etc) is much safer.
Losing your phone is one of the most problematic things that can happen nowadays.
All Optus services are down, I said it before, once a business gets hacked if they do nothing to fix the issue it will happen again. People still trust in Optus, if people don't move away from it and go to something else then its no fault but their own, you can't beat a dead horse unfortunately, you'll get no where.
People still trust in Optus
bro my data got leaked and then they kindly upped the cost of the plan I was on
yep I wasn't even a optus customer for 15 years but my data get leaked replacing my passport and license wasn't fun.
I'm with Circles Live - Optus MVNO
So just because Optus got hacked, doesn't mean everyone on optus network need to move away.
This doesn't seem like a hack. Who hacks a major telco at 4am?
Never let a system failure and chance to blame Russia/China/Rabid-anti-vaxxers/political opponents go to waste.
Who hacks a major telco at 4am?
You think the entire world is in the same 4AM timezone?
It's always 4am somewhere
once a business gets hacked if they do nothing to fix the issue it will happen again.
The hacking angle doesn't pan out. It's almost certainly a BGP/routing issue as this likely internal comment from Optus suggests and the fact that there was a huge spike in BGP announcements at exactly the same time the issue was first reported. This suggests a major (poorly-planned) internal change was made on the Optus network at that time which caused the issue.
DDOS'ing a national carrier for +7 hours is not a trivial task for non-state threat actors like cybercriminals or hacktivists; it would require a lot of manpower, a lot of botnets with a lot of bandwidth and there would be zero financial motivation to carry out such an attack and a lot of risk.
State actors could do it more easily but again, qui bono? Unless someone is planning is a hostile takeover of Optus and/or trying to eliminate competition in the highly-coveted Australian telecommunications market (lol), why the f**k would any state actor with the capability bother attacking Optus when all of Australia's cyber-security defences are like Swiss cheese including those of far more important governmental branches/institutions?
BGP routing issues have caused similar or even larger-scale outages in the past:
BGP flaws and how to address them
In 2004, a Turkish ISP called TTNet accidentally advertised incorrect BGP routes to its neighbors. These routes claimed that TTNet itself was the best destination for all traffic on the Internet. As these routes spread further and further to more autonomous systems, a massive disruption occurred, creating a one-day crisis where many people across the world were not able to access some or all of the Internet.Similarly, in 2008, a Pakistani ISP attempted to use a BGP route to block Pakistani users from visiting YouTube. The ISP then accidentally advertised these routes with its neighboring ASes and the route quickly spread across the Internet’s BGP network. This route sent users trying to access YouTube to a dead end, which resulted in YouTube’s being inaccessible for several hours.
Great post. Cheers!
Despite all the technical mumbo-jumbos, most of us are layman users. A telecommunications outage of this magnitude is rare worldwide, let alone Australia. Not much info came out of Optus after a few hours. Isn't it a common practice to fallback to the last working point in order to restore the network traffic? I am just wondering how many Optus heads will roll for this disaster and how users will be compensated.
A telecommunications outage of this magnitude is rare worldwide, let alone Australia.
If you see the quoted text in my post above, BPG outages like this or even larger have occurred in the past.
It's not unheard of and they're always caused by incompetence.
I also don't get the "let alone Australia" part. Our telco infrastructure has always been garbage relative to most of the first world and still lags behind many nations that are firmly developing economies. If any national carrier is dumb enough to take down their whole network for over 7 hours, it would be an Australian national carrier.
Isn't it a common practice to fallback to the last working point in order to restore the network traffic?
In an ideal world but evidently Optus like to live life dangerously and make major changes to their entire network without having suitable redundancies/contingencies in place.
BGP is effectively like GPS for Internet traffic. When data packets don't know where to go, you can't just hop into the DeLorean and go back in time to the day before the outage.
I am just wondering how many Optus heads will roll for this disaster and how users will be compensated.
Given the crickets and tumbleweeds that came out of their hacking scandal, I expect precisely not much will happen in the wake of this outage other than token apologies.
@Miami Mall Alien: "I also don't get the "let alone Australia" part. Our telco infrastructure has always been garbage relative to most of the first world and still lags behind many nations that are firmly developing economies. If any national carrier is dumb enough to take down their whole network for over 7 hours, it would be an Australian national carrier."
Always? I mean, sure, the last few decades, but I don't think I would say always!
@BendBridge: They really aren't all that rare, it is pretty common for network admins to screw up BGP, 99% of the time these will be admin errors. it happens, what has surprised me here is how long they have taken to get control of it.
@gromit: People make mistakes, what is inexcusable is laziness and careless which is almost always the reason why mistakes become catastrphies.
Whats the bet someone was too lazy to get a review of some file changes that eventually update some routing somewhere… or someone just approved without actually checking etc.
THis was probably made worse that the people who could rollback the changes didnt even know what was changed because the original person was too lazy to tell everyone that some changes were going to happen. This is waht probably caused the hours, eventually one team found out about another and figured out what changed then the rest was easy.
@CowFrogHorse: yep totally agree. complacency and laziness. I have done this routing update 100 times, no need to have someone double check, no need to backup current router config, cowboy hat on lets get it done so we can go home before 5am.
@gromit: You shouldnt be backing up anything…
All these files should be in source control, and if a deployment goes bad, it should be easy to push the previous version.
Manual processes like requiring a person to make a backup is part of the problem.
@CowFrogHorse: you should absolutely be backing up, what if your source control ends up being the source of the corruption or issue. Source control and automated deployments is only one facet of DR and configuration management. It is potentially your main recovery point, but many systems are a lot more than just their config files.
you should absolutely be backing up, what if your source control ends up being the source of the corruption or issue.
Im sorry i disagree.
If you cant capture your config as files and it put in source control like i mention for versionng then theres something seriously broken there, and said team havent done their job properly from the start.
It is potentially your main recovery point, but many systems are a lot more than just their config files.
No they arent. Everything should and can be a file in source control - if its not then said people havent done their homew ork and are taking short cuts, which will fail when someone forgets because shit does happen.
@CowFrogHorse: Interesting to read the discussion between @gromit and @CowFrogHorse. My feeling is one has never worked in a telecommunications environment.
@BendBridge: BendBridge:
Im not sure if youc ant write complete sentences or youa re admitting telecos are full of cowboys who never plan do things properly.
@CowFrogHorse: Sorry @CowFrogHorse. What I meant to say was one of you had never worked in a telco environment to realise the complexity of such a system.
@CowFrogHorse: I hope to never be reliant on a system that needs recovering from you. Sorry but your attitude is what led to disasters like what happened at the ATO and other organisations where they rely on a single point of failure thinking their single recovery source is enough without considering that the source of the failure can be the source control.
@gromit: @gromit
Your answers demonstrate the very problem i was alluding too.
You say for example single source of failure, but that doesnt actually mean anything. Its very broad and can mean many many things. Being incomplete like this is what leads to mistakes or assumptions and just pretending somethign is close enough.
Please try and actually say what part of my statement is wrong.
If you have a release and its working, just like Optus had before 4am yday, then it should have been very much possible to push the new changes, wait a bit, then realise its shite, and rollback to the previous version.
Now your claiming you cant trust your source control, then you have a bigger problem, because Optus pre 4am version should be exaclty the same as the previous release in their source control. if its not then you have cowboys playing with production which means you arent really prepared. Of course feel free to actually point out what part of my reasoning here and before is wrong - dont tell me im wrong, SHOW AND DESCRIBE TO ME why my statements are wrong,
Your reasoning is incpmplete, and tahts bad you should be able to reason and share with us here WHY.
Doing stuff manually doesnt really work as the scale gets larger, i think that would be obvious, not only for the time thing but because of the potential for (profanity) when humans do things manually. If someone has to manually backup some files for 100 machines and then repeat if a deploy. People make mistakes…
Theres simply no way Google for example manually does any config on their zillions of machines, and this is because their process and the automation means this has been thought out and works. When it fails the rollback is also automated. if something goes wrong in the rollback, theres simply no way admins are going to look at each and every machine and restore the config etc from files one by one.Feel free to tell me why a previous version would be broken if it was previously fine. The only way that previous version is broken is if other future changes themselves are broken and thats the real problem.
What you dont get, is failing well is a demostration of quality and readiness. Failing well, unlike Optus is what world class is about. If Optus had properly tested their rollbacks etc nobody would have known any shit hit the fan. Its pretty obvious the delays were because they didnt have a clue for half the day what was released earlier that morning and they were shitting themselves trying to figure it out etc.
Being ready to handle mistakes is the difference between doing thigns properly and (profanity) up like Optus when they should have pushed the previous known release and nobody woul dhave known by the daylight.
There are a lot of assumptions in there….
@Goremans: Maybe next time you can write a complete sentence…
but like ive been mentioning previously your too lazy to even do that properly, because tht would require effort and some attempt at doing something to completion with thought.
@Goremans: Like i said its people like you that cause what happened at Optus. You contribute nothing here, except show your total lack of class or ability to write a proper sentence like an adult.
@CowFrogHorse: Im not sure if I should refer to you as, Cow, Frog, or Horse. However you wish to be named, I fear you're a sad and lonely soul.
All you have contributed in this thread is divisional and arrogant rants that carry the stench of a superiority complex.
EDIT: lol! 9min ago you posted this on another thread, quote: "You obviously dont live in the real world, where not everything is perfect and hard decisions have to be made".
Perhaps you should take your own advice. Be happy, life is good. (Even with 7hrs of no Optus).
Mine’s cycling between no service and SOS.
Coles MobileDown Down, Network is down 🎵🎶
Anyone else plagued by the NAB Bank Network coming down last night ?
It affected their App, their Website, and their ATMs.
I got stuck at the shops looking like an idiot, not able to pay for one hour.
Confirmed with Optus they are experiencing a major outage at the moment. They stated they would have another update in 4 hours time.
What take them so long, they could just turn off and turn on again ?
I'm on amaysim, My network is down and I can only receive SOS signals.
same here :/
same with catch mobile
Lol metro trains also stuffed due to optus being their back up
What's their primary? Coles mobile?
Could be Dodo mobile
One.tel.
Lyca Mobile
Yeah mine is down in Perth at the moment
https://www.news.com.au/technology/online/internet/major-opt…
Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil issued a statement on Wednesday morning, saying the government is “seeking information from Optus on the major outage”.
“We understand from reports that the telco is working to resolve the outage as soon as possible,” the spokesperson said.
This outage panicked me for a sec and was worried about a sim swap scam. I’m on Coles mobile. Anyone know if we can put an extra layer of protection on our accounts to try to prevent a sim swap scammer?
interesting little site put together by some sort of telco/uni initiative with some funding, but unless i'm mistaken, the website just describes the issue and what to "look out for". im keen to know if "we can put an extra layer of protection on our accounts to try to prevent a sim swap scammer"
i'll contact coles chat once the app is back up - the whole thing is down with the optus outage. its a system! lol
It did mention to use a separate private mobile number exclusively for authentication which I think is a good suggestion. You can access the SMS remotely through a device authenticated means (look into beeper/join)
@FutureTech: How does this work?
Does my simcard with the mobile no. To receive 2FA sms need to be in a mobile?
Or can i set it up woth beeper once, remove and forget? And get the sms 2FA via the beeper app.
@zorodluffy: You will need to keep the sim in a mobile with a constant internet connection unfortunately. This is because beeper uses Google Messenger to sync your SMS which is over internet. An alternative that doesn't require a spare phone and internet is VOIP providers who you can port your mobile phone number into (eg Crazytel). You can port your secret mobile number to them and set up an automatic email to a secret mailbox (which you only use for this purpose and never disclose to anyone). This does come at a cost (last time I checked it is $10 pm for Crazytel).
@FutureTech: Ah dang, my gf got me a new phone, awesome phone but no physical dual sim.
So havent been able to use my 2nd. Mobile no.
Been looking for a solution lol
@FutureTech: Yah i was thinking that, but i am using amaysim prepaid at $10 a year, and i dont think they do esim.
Dont wanna port to another one that does and pay more then that
@zorodluffy: I think Amaysim does do esims - https://www.amaysim.com.au/help/mobile/what-is-an-esim#accor…
The footer
This project is funded by
and it has the OPTUS logo…… hahahahahahahahahahah!!!!!
Yep… Amaysim down this morning, in Sydney.
Is it huge incompetence or sabotage? Place your bets…
I'm sorry for everyone who had specific plans requiring a phone this morning. Like meeting someone and waiting for a call, making a bank transfer for house deposit, being a doctor on call… The consequences can be pretty bad…
Should be mandatory disclosure rules for any doctor who use optus.
Incompetence will always blame hackers, because its never their fault..
Agreed 100%
All these companies being negligent with our data should be seriously punished for every leak or hack… If they collect (or keep) data, it's their responsibility to keep that safe.
Both home internet and phone internet down
Let that be a lesson… don't put all your eggs in one basket.
Same. Deliberately planned a day off today to do some gaming and stream some shows. Pretty annoyed. Might just have to day drink instead.
Might just have to day drink instead.
business as usual?
Mobile connection is down for me in metro Vic, did a bit of fault finding on my main mobile then transferred sim onto my spare/backup with same SoS fault. Logged onto my Optus account at work to make sure no payment issues, then searched the net for outage, to find the issue at hand.
First it was the data breach, now this BS! All in one year, a year after Gladys Berejiklian "was parachuted into the newly created role of Managing Director, Enterprise, Business and Institutional for Optus in February last year after she abruptly resigned as premier in 2021". Coincidence, is Daryl Maguire lurking around…..?
Good thing every Ozbargainer should have Boost SIMs still working 🤣
Have they tried turning the network off then rebooting ;)
Probably can't get thru to their own network engineers.
Honestly Optus has such terrible internal communication I wouldn't be surprised. Let alone external communication to public. Got out of there quick lmao
Optus mobile network down right now ?
'yes'
Mate from UK was roaming on optus. Not working for him now either…
Either a security certificate expired and someone forgot to renew or DNS issue.
Its most likely an Alien invasion, I saw it in a documentary called Independence Day! the Aliens are using the optus satellites to co-ordinate their attack.
Poor aliens… Someone should tell them that's not gonna work…
you are right because their plan would exposed by a data breach
Gladsy has expanded her empire now it's not only nsw being ruined by her lol.
Same here, ABB in QLD
"Aussie BB Mobile services nationwide are experiencing connection difficulties. Technicians are investigating. There is currently no ETR."
Teltra must be luvin this
It was only a few months ago where Telstra faced major outage.
Don’t recall this happening - they had a major data (calls / landline internet still working fine) and a seperate one in NSW/QLD that prevented people making calls but still had mobile data.
This outage is next level:
- Australia wide
- All customers (personal, business, enterprise - like hospitals are literally unable to make/receive calls)
- All calls + messaging is down (mobile and landlines)
- All data is down (mobile data and home internet)
- All resellers impacted (Coles/amaysim/etc.)Probably finally enough to make me switch off of Optus
it's truly remarkable the scale of this outage. seriously, how the f does this happen?
It was a while ago but let's not forget Telstra had a bunch of similar massive outages that led to them doing the free data days.
my home internet is down
it has started.
skynet has become self aware
Skynet: Let me disconnect this guy from the Internet so that I can… Oh sh*t…
Thinking what kind of compensation is available. Will give it a go with customer service and post back
Tbh strong chance customer service is unreachable given Optus internet and phone services are down. At this point I imagine customer services doesn't want this to come back online to face to the 10million peeps
yea cant even receive the SMS one-time code to get into optus app chat Lol
tried to change plan (downgrade it ready to port out) and couldn't because it needed a 1time code :')
Average day as an optus customer
If Telstra didn't keep jacking up my monthly fee on the pretence of 'more data' that I didn't use I would have stayed with them. :)
I left Boost for the same reason I don't need the extra data, Optus does not even have 5g in my area and their 4g sucks I am on a cheap Amaysim plan and data is almost unusable in my house and even well populated suburbs
OMG same I was worried my Sim card got hijacked and they are clearing my bank accounts right now.