AT&T Technical Glitch
AT&T encountered a widespread network disruption nationwide on Thursday morning, causing cellular service and internet connectivity to falter, as indicated by the Downdetector monitoring site. While some Verizon and T-Mobile users also reported service issues, they seemed to be less pervasive compared to AT&T’s ordeal.
AT&T Outage issues reported today morning:
AT&T Outage
t approximately 4 a.m. ET Thursday, customers registered over 32,000 AT&T outages. By 7 a.m., this figure surged beyond 50,000, with the majority of complaints emanating from major urban centers such as Houston, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Atlanta, according to Downdetector. Just before 8 a.m. ET, the number of reported outages surpassed 71,000.
Meanwhile, around 7 a.m. Thursday, T-Mobile documented slightly over 1,100 outages, while Verizon recorded approximately 3,000. The root cause behind this service disruption remains unclear.
AT&T Services Downtime
AT&T promptly acknowledged the issue on Thursday morning, stating, “Some of our customers are experiencing wireless service interruptions this morning. We are working urgently to restore service to them. We encourage the use of Wi-Fi calling until service is restored.”
Verizon and T-Mobile Networks Unaffected by Inter-Carrier Outages
On the other hand, Verizon clarified that the outages did not directly affect their network but rather impacted their customers attempting to connect with another carrier facing the issue. T-Mobile also assured early Thursday that its network was operational, suggesting that Downdetector’s figures likely reflected customers trying to reach users on other networks.
Emergency Services Disrupted: AT&T Outage Impacts 911 Accessibility
The widespread outages raise concerns, particularly regarding the inability of some individuals to reach emergency services like 911. San Francisco’s Fire Department confirmed awareness of an issue affecting AT&T wireless customers, including difficulties in making or receiving 911 calls. Similarly, emergency authorities in Chicago, Virginia’s Prince William County, and North Carolina’s Charlotte-Mecklenburg issued alerts regarding the outage, acknowledging brief disruptions in 911 accessibility.
Atlanta Mayor Addresses AT&T Outage
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens expressed the city’s commitment to resolving the issue, affirming that Atlanta’s e-911 services remained functional. He noted, “We have received calls from AT&T customers that their cellular phones are in SOS mode,” indicating the severity of the situation.
Why AT&T went down today?
AT&T has encountered sporadic outages over the past few days, including a temporary 911 outage in some parts of the southeastern United States. Although outages happen from time to time, nationwide, prolonged outages are exceedingly rare. Although AT&T provided no official reason for the outage, the issue appears to be related to how cellular services hand off calls from one network to the next, a process known as peering, according to an industry source who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
There’s no indication that Thursday’s outage was the result of a cyberattack or other malicious activity, the industry source said. Verizon believes the nationwide outage involving AT&T customers “is close to being resolved,” according to Richard Young, a Verizon spokesman.
Carriers are notoriously mum about why their networks go down. In the past, there have been construction accidents that have cut fiberoptic cables, incidents of sabotage or network updates filled with bugs that became difficult to roll back.” keep the human like tone
Why AT&T Had an Outage?
So, AT&T had a bit of a hiccup recently. It’s not unheard of for these big networks to go on the fritz every now and then, but when it happens nationwide, it sure catches everyone’s attention.
Now, why did this happen? Well, AT&T hasn’t spilled the beans officially, but word on the street (or should I say, industry insiders) is that it might have something to do with how calls are handed off between different networks. You know, that technical dance called peering.
Before you start thinking it’s some sort of cyber mischief, relax. According to a sneaky insider who wishes to remain anonymous, there’s no evidence of foul play here.
Verizon chimed in, saying they think the whole mess with AT&T users should be sorted soon. At least someone’s giving us a heads-up.
As for why these things happen, carriers like to keep that under wraps. Could be anything from a construction oopsie cutting through cables to a wonky software update they can’t quite undo. It’s all part of the mystery of modern technology.
