Optus sent a notification about a deadly triple-zero outage to the wrong email address, according to the Department of Communications.
The Singapore-owned telco sent two emails to the department on the day, one at 2.45pm notifying about the outage and another at 2.52pm advising the matter had been resolved, department deputy secretary for communications and media James Chisholm said.
But the emails were sent to a redundant address, meaning the department didn’t learn about the outage until it was called by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) at 3.30pm on 19 September, more than 36 hours after the outage began.
It was also revealed during a Senate hearing that the department switched the email just seven days before the outage and notified telcos, which was acknowledged by Optus.
An Optus spokesperson said they “take these matters extremely seriously and remain committed to full transparency and accountability”.
“The independent review led by Dr Kerry Schott, is examining all the relevant correspondence, timelines, and processes. Dr Schott’s report is expected to be completed by the end of the year. In the interests of respecting the integrity of the independent review process and the ACMA investigation, we will not pre-empt the findings,” the spokesperson said.
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