Tens of thousands of cell phone users experienced outages Thursday morning for their home phone, internet, and mobile phone services, which sparked fears of a possible cyber attack.
Now, AT&T says they have identified what caused the shocking outage for over 73,000 Americans as footage has emerged showing helpless AT&T store workers being harassed by angry customers.
The company announced in a statement that the outage was not a cyberattack but an unspecified coding error caused by “the application and execution of an incorrect process used as we were expanding our network.”
The “incorrect process in question” is related to a software update gone awry. Moreover, according to ABC News, the outage was not caused by an external actor.
The company went on to say they perform updates regularly.
Following the outage, The New York Post uncovered viral X posts of angry customers going off on helpless AT&T workers. One post shows a confused worker shrugging his shoulders outside a store surrounded by frustrated individuals.
They done walked AT&T down buddy just work there pic.twitter.com/IjAePm5KFj
— JP (@lostfilesjp) February 22, 2024
Another X post shows an AT&T worker getting blasted by a livid customer over the service interruption, causing the worker to flip out in response.
Customer: I can’t even get a text message or a phone call out.
Worker: But sir, what do you want me to do? What the hell, man! Sir, we’re having an outage! Do you know what an outage is?
Customer: I know what an outage is.
Worker: So what the f**k do you want me to do? I don’t know what the f**k to tell you.
Y’all stressing me out. I already don’t get paid enough.
WATCH:
AT&T Outage Today Had This Employee In Florida Stressed Tf Out pic.twitter.com/usNAS4ur3F
— Raphouse TV (RHTV) (@raphousetv7) February 22, 2024
AT&T, which serves over 290 million users in America, spent over 10 hours on Thursday restoring its service. The outages began at roughly 4 a.m. ET before finally being restored by 2:15 p.m. ET.
As previously reported by TGP, outages were also reported on T-Mobile and Verizon. Those carriers, however, claimed their issues were likely caused by customers trying to call or text AT&T users.
“Some customers experienced issues this morning when calling or texting with customers served by another carrier. We are continuing to monitor the situation,” a Verizon spokesperson told ABC News.
“We did not experience an outage. Our network is operating normally. Down Detector is likely reflecting challenges our customers were having attempting to connect to users on other networks,” said a T-Mobile spokesperson.
Cricket, which AT&T owns, reported having 11,000 customers affected.
The cellular outage was so awful that some customers’ phones were stuck in SOS mode, meaning users could only call emergency services. However, some 911 centers were also unable to receive calls.
PWC Alert: AT&T has reported that some 9-1-1 calls may not be received by the county. If your 9-1-1 call does not go thru, please call 703-792-6500 to report an emergency. An update will be sent once the problem has been resolved. https://t.co/NSZtJ2lze7
— Prince William County Police Department (@PWCPolice) February 22, 2024
We are aware of an issue impacting AT&T wireless customers from making and receiving any phone calls (including to 911).
We are actively engaged and monitoring this.
The San Francisco 911 center is still operational.
If you are an AT&T customer and cannot get through to 911,… pic.twitter.com/TUIEBkqmkI
— SAN FRANCISCO FIRE DEPARTMENT MEDIA (@SFFDPIO) February 22, 2024
CMPD is aware of a nationwide outage impacting AT&T cell phone customers this morning. Customers were briefly unable to contact 9-1-1. There are no disruptions to our call center’s ability to receive 9-1-1 calls. Service should be returning shortly.
— CMPD News (@CMPD) February 22, 2024
White House spokesman John Kirby claimed Thursday afternoon that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security were also looking into the outage.
We are being told AT&T has no reason to think this was a cyber or security incident. “But the bottom line is we don’t have all the answers.
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