AT&T said Thursday morning that the company is experiencing a cellular outage that began before dawn and affected phone service across the country.
The outage began around 4 a.m. ET, but AT&T did not comment on the outage until several hours later. Complaints about the outage grew through the morning, reaching more than 60,000 on an online site that tracks wireless service outages.
“Some of our customers are experiencing wireless service interruptions this morning,” the company said in a statement. “We are working urgently to restore service to them. We encourage the use of Wi-Fi calling until service is restored.”
The company did not say what had happened to cause the problem, nor when it expected the issue to be resolved.
Updates
100% of service restored
3:26 p.m. ET Feb. 22: AT&T said that all of its network has been resorted following the nationwide outage.
“We have restored wireless service to all our affected customers. We sincerely apologize to them. Keeping our customers connected remains our top priority, and we are taking steps to ensure our customers do not experience this again in the future,” AT&T said on its website.
It is still unclear what caused the outage today.
-- Jessica Goodman, Cox Media Group National Content Desk
75% of service restored
1:30 p.m. ET Feb. 22: AT&T is now reporting that 75% of its network is back up and working, following the nationwide outage.
“Our network teams took immediate action and so far three-quarters of our network has been restored,” an AT&T spokesperson said. “We are working as quickly as possible to restore service to remaining customers.”
AT&T has not yet said what caused today’s outage.
The latest numbers
1:23 p.m. ET Feb. 22: Outages from several carriers have declined steadily through today.
Here are the latest numbers, according to Downdetector.
AT&T: 16,700
Cricket Wireless: 3,100
Original story:
Sen. Rick Scott, R-Florida, said he had reached out to AT&T to get information on the outage.
I just reached out to @ATT to get an update on this concerning issue. Florida law enforcement is doing everything it can to keep people safe, and I expect AT&T to keep us informed on what it is doing to get 911 services fully back online ASAP. https://t.co/CTMty0XFNI
— Rick Scott (@SenRickScott) February 22, 2024
“Florida law enforcement is doing everything it can to keep people safe, and I expect AT&T to keep us informed on what it is doing to get 911 services fully back online ASAP,” he said in a post on the social media platform X, formerly Twitter,
A cellular outage was also reported by T-Mobile, Verizon and other network users, according to the outage tracking website Downdetector.com.
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Downdetector said that most of the reported problems appeared to be in major cities, listing Los Angeles, Dallas, San Diego, Houston, San Antonio, Honolulu, Chicago, San Francisco and Atlanta.
According to AT&T’s website, there were also wireless outages in Milwaukee and Richmond, Virginia, with the initial cause listed as “maintenance activity.”
More than 31,900 AT&T wireless customers reported outages at around 4:30 a.m. ET, according to data from Downdetector. ABC News reported that AT&T suffered a major outage that started just before 4 a.m. Thursday.
By 7:12 a.m. ET, more than 51,000 people had reported problems with AT&T service. At 8 a.m., that number topped 69,000.
Most users, 54%, complained that they were having issues with mobile phone service. More than a third of customers reported having no signal at all, and 8% of users said their mobile internet was down.
Verizon and T-Mobile wireless customers in the U.S. reported more than 800 service outages on the platform in the early morning hours, according to Reuters.
By 7 a.m. ET, that number had grown to more than 3,900 complaints.
However, Verizon and T-Mobile said in statements that their networks were operating normally.
“Some customers experienced issues this morning when calling or texting with customers served by another carrier,” Verizon said. “We are continuing to monitor the situation.”
In an email to The New York Times, T-Mobile said: “We did not experience an outage. Our network is operating normally. Downdetector is likely reflecting challenges our customers were having attempting to connect to users on other networks.”
Downdetector tracks outages by collating status reports from sources including user-submitted errors.
According to Erie County 911, First Net, a network that connects first responders, is being affected by the outage.
A post on X from the San Francisco Fire Department said the outage was impacting people’s ability to reach emergency services by dialing 911.
— SAN FRANCISCO FIRE DEPARTMENT MEDIA (@SFFDPIO) February 22, 2024We 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
WSB is reporting that Atlanta police officers had difficulties communicating with city phones; however, they believe that during the incident, the Atlanta E-911 center was fully operational.
Our Communications Section is in contact with AT&T and we are monitoring the #outage situation involving some commercial cellular carriers. Some carriers have coverage, but if you need to call 911 and cannot do so, use a landline if possible until situation is resolved.
— Mass State Police (@MassStatePolice) February 22, 2024
Check back for more on this developing story.
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