Barnaby Joyce has called for a thorough investigation into Wednesday’s nationwide Telstra outage, saying authorities should examine whether there is any link to foreign interference despite there being no evidence of a cyber attack.
The outage, which began shortly after 3am, disrupted mobile calls, data services and affected some Triple Zero calls, with customers in Sydney, Melbourne and other capital cities reporting a loss of connectivity.
Telstra has since restored most services and says it is continuing to investigate the cause.
Speaking to Sky News, Joyce said the government should not dismiss the possibility of foreign involvement, citing China’s recent intercontinental ballistic missile test in the South Pacific.
“I don’t want to be paranoid or a conspiracy theorist, but we know there is the capacity for China to affect that sort of software and that sort of network,” he said.
“It’s better to be cautious and to have things cleared up than to just dismiss that out of hand … I do think (there needs to be) a diligent process.”
Joyce questioned whether it was “just a coincidence” that China’s missile launch occurred two days before the outage.
However, Telstra chief financial officer Michael Ackland said there was no evidence of malicious activity.
He said the fault had been traced to network “nodes” responsible for synchronising time across Telstra’s mobile network, with engineers working to restore affected systems across data centres in Sydney and Melbourne.
By about 10am, Telstra said almost 90 per cent of its mobile network had been restored, although services for some customers continued to recover.
The outage also affected customers of providers that use Telstra’s network, including Everyday Mobile, Aldi Mobile, Tangerine, Boost and Belong.
Communications Minister Anika Wells confirmed some Triple Zero calls from Telstra devices failed during the outage, with welfare checks under way for affected callers.
“The key priorities for today are to get people back online and ensure any welfare checks are completed urgently,” Wells and Emergency Management Minister Kristy McBain said in a joint statement.
They urged Australians not to make test calls to Triple Zero.
“If you need to call Triple Zero and can’t get through, it is recommended that you use another device, a landline or Wi-Fi calling.”
“It is very important that people do not make ‘test’ calls to Triple Zero – please only call 000 if there is an emergency.”
The ministers confirmed the Australian Communications and Media Authority would conduct a full investigation into the outage once services had been fully restored.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described the outage as “deeply concerning” and said investigations were continuing.
“At this stage, what Telstra have indicated to the government is that they don’t see this as being – there is no evidence of it being malicious, but those investigations are under way.”
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