A major outage that knocked out cell phone service for tens of thousands of AT&T customers for several hours on Thursday was likely caused by a glitch in a software update. Photos circulating online show helpless AT&T store employees being harassed by angry customers.
AT&T says the massive service disruption, which affected more than 70,000 users across the U.S. and parts of Canada at its peak, was due to an unspecified coding error rather than a cyberattack as widely feared. insisted.
“Based on our initial investigation, we believe today’s outage was caused by the incorrect application and execution of processes used when expanding our network,” the carrier said in a statement late Thursday.
The “improper process in question” is reportedly related to a failed software update, according to preliminary information from two sources familiar with the matter. told ABC News on condition of anonymity.
The outage, which prevents customers from making phone calls or sending text messages, was not caused by a malicious external attacker, one of the media’s sources said.
As seen in photos and videos circulating on X, some disgruntled AT&T customers flocked to local cell phone stores to vent their frustrations over the outages.
One post, which has garnered more than 19 million views, shows a clearly perplexed AT&T employee standing among a crowd outside the store.
The accompanying caption read, “They trampled AT&T.” “Buddy just works there.”
Another post from X showed an AT&T employee in Florida being assaulted by a man over service interruptions.
“I can’t even text or call,” a disgruntled customer whines.
“But what do you want me to do, sir? What the hell?” The disgusted clerk added: Do you know what a power outage is? ”
“I know what a power outage is,” the man replied.
“So what do you want me to do?” the worker shoots back. “I don’t know what to say. You guys are stressing me out. I’m already underpaid.”
AT&T, the nation’s largest mobile carrier whose 5G network covers about 290 million users in the United States, spent more than 10 hours on Thursday trying to restore service.
Trouble tracking service Downdetector noted that the outage, which began around 3:30 a.m., peaked with about 73,000 reported incidents.
It was restored by 2:15 p.m.
“We are taking steps to ensure our customers will never experience an incident like this again,” AT&T said on its website.
The Federal Communications Commission said it was investigating the outage, and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said it was working with cell phone companies to figure out what happened.
White House Press Secretary John Kirby said the FBI and Department of Homeland Security were also investigating the failure.
“AT&T has been told there is no reason to believe this is a cyber or security incident,” Kirby said. “But the bottom line is we don’t have all the answers.”
with post wire
