ACMA sues Optus over 2025 outage blocked emergency calls

Australia's second-largest telecommunications provider, Optus, is facing Federal Court action over a major network outage last year that left hundreds of customers unable to connect to emergency services. The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) launched proceedings on Thursday, July 30, 2026, alleging Optus Mobile breached its legal obligations more than a thousand times during the incident.

The outage occurred on September 18, 2025, and lasted for approximately 13 hours, disrupting mobile voice and data services across parts of South Australia, Western Australia, the Northern Territory, and far west New South Wales. The ACMA alleges that during this period, Optus failed to provide access to the emergency call service and failed to ensure those calls were carried to the correct termination point on 1,005 occasions. The regulator is seeking declarations of contravention and financial penalties, with a maximum potential fine of $250,000 per breach.

ACMA chair Nerida O’Loughlin stated that the outage undermined a fundamental public safety requirement. She emphasized that providing reliable access to emergency services is a core legal obligation for...