How chaos unfolded again for Australia’s most disaster-prone company
Is Optus underfunded by its Singaporean owners, grossly incompetent or dizzyingly unlucky? The unfolding of its fatal Triple Zero outage suggests it is, at best, a slow learner.
It was a seemingly normal Thursday for Optus’ unassuming Irish chief executive, Stephen Rue, until word reached him at 1.30pm of a worrying customer complaint about the national emergency Triple Zero line being dead.
It wasn’t yet a red alert moment. But it was worrying enough for Rue to seek immediate advice from colleagues, including the recently appointed managing director of its networks Tony Baird. Rue was told Optus’ services were running fine nationwide except that there could be problems caused by a routine update of the company’s firewalls, which protect it against disruptive cyberattacks.
Paul SmithTechnology editorPaul Smith edits the technology coverage and has been a leading writer on the sector for 20 years. He covers big tech, business use of tech, the fast-growing Australian tech industry and start-ups, telecommunications and national innovation policy. Connect with Paul on Twitter. Email Paul at psmith@afr.com
