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Optus: Telecoms Company Sent Emails to Wrong Addresses During Deadly Outage

Optus sent emergency outage alerts to an unmonitored government email, delaying response and leaving over 600 emergency calls unanswered, linked to three deaths, officials said.

  • On Tuesday, Communications Minister Anika Wells met Optus chief executive Stephen Rue and introduced triple-zero watchdog legislation after meeting Telstra and TPG executives.
  • A routine firewall upgrade at Optus prevented more than 600 triple-zero calls in South Australia, the Northern Territory, Western Australia and parts of New South Wales and failed to redirect calls as legally required.
  • Department officials said Optus emails at 2:45pm and 2:52pm on September 18 went to a defunct address, sat unread for over 24 hours, and Chisholm stated, `That communication... was sent to the wrong address, which we have told industry a number of times is not to be used as a source for notification.`
  • The minister told telco bosses they are legally responsible for triple-zero access and met executives as Mr Rue faced mounting pressure since last month.
  • The incident has been linked to three deaths and more than 2100 emergency calls failed, with triple-zero custodian laws taking effect from November requiring real-time reporting to ACMA.
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20 Articles

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Right

Australian telecom sent alert to wrong emails during deadly outage

3 died last month as 2 outages disrupted services for thousands of Australians - Anadolu Ajansı

·Ankara, Türkiye
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Center

Optus: Telecoms company sent emails to wrong addresses during deadly outage

The outage in Australia has been linked to four deaths as people could not reach emergency services.

·United Kingdom
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Lean Left

Opposition says minister didn't tell the truth about Optus outage | Evening News Bulletin 8 October 2025

More fallout fromn the Optus Triple zero scandal, with the opposition accusing the government of not telling the truth... new research shows women are genetically more likely to get depressed than men... and multiple reports that Australian captain Pat Cummins will not be fit for the start of the Ashes

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Wrong email bungle compounds Optus triple-zero woes

Federal authorities only found out about a catastrophic Optus triple-zero outage a day after it was resolved because...

·Canberra, Australia
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Optus email mishap left department in dark about triple-0 outage

The telco operator sent two emails about its outage, which understated its extent, to a departmental email address that had been changed a week earlier.

·Australia
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9News9News
Lean Right

Optus sent triple-zero outage notification to wrong government email address

Optus sent its notifications to the government about its massive triple-zero outage to the wrong email addr...

·Australia
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The Queenslander broke the news in on Tuesday, October 7, 2025.
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