Confusion as more than 100,000 mobile users receive ‘undelivered’ texts
More than 100,000 undelivered texts were suddenly sent this week, causing massive confusion to the baffled recipients.
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A maintenance update has caused mass confusion, with dozens reporting they suddenly received strange, out-of-context messages from old lovers or dead people this week.
A maintenance update affecting mobile carriers in the US caused the old text messages from months or years ago to suddenly be delivered over Wednesday evening and Thursday morning, according to a report from The Verge.
One man posted to social media, saying his wife got an old message from him in the middle of the night, causing her to suspect him of cheating. Others received old Valentine’s Day texts from past lovers, calling it “awkward”.
Some of the messages had been delayed from February to November this year, but others were much older, dating back as far as Valentine’s Day two years ago.
Numerous people posted about the texts on social media last night, including a detailed report by the Reddit Bureau of Investigation (RBI) on Reddit. One user compiled numerous screenshots of people who’d received the old texts, including one panicked user asking, “Why did my phone send a text without me knowing?”
Phone users were baffled by the texts, explaining they didn’t “hit resend” and received messages that were entirely out of context.
A radio DJ from Augusta, Maine in the US said he woke just after 5am to receive a response to a quote he’d asked for from a wedding DJ on February 14.
Not sure what happened but my phone sent texts last night, while I was dead asleep, and I received texts that people didn’t send...
— Shannon. (@shannundead) November 7, 2019
Lmaoo awkward. I got a text from my ex about how he can’t wait to see me tonight and I went off thinking he was trying to make me think it was meant to be to someone else. He got a text from me too. Valentines day of all days. There must be so many awkward moments today. 🤣🤣
— ♡ Laura (@imlaurax) November 7, 2019
According to the report, complaints came from people using all mobile phone carriers in the US, on both iPhone and Android devices, and there have been reports of the texts arriving for users in Canada and users of Google Voice.
A spokesman for one carrier, Sprint, said the issue was caused by a “maintenance update” and had now been resolved. The spokesman apologised for any confusion caused by the texts.
Verizon, another carrier, claimed a text message service, Syniverse, could be blamed for the glitch.
Syniverse said internal maintenance of their service had been responsible for the old texts suddenly being delivered.
“While the issue has been resolved, we are in the process of reviewing our internal procedures to ensure this does not happen again,” Syniverse chief marketing and product officer William Hurley told CNET.
The company said the issue had caused 168,149 undelivered messages to be delivered during the week.
Originally published as Confusion as more than 100,000 mobile users receive ‘undelivered’ texts