Verizon has fully restored its mobile network after a disruption that impacted thousands of customers across the U.S. on Monday.
Verizon’s mobile customers are facing network issues at a time when the telecom operator decided to cut its 2024 capital expenditures (capex) to $17 billion – $17.5 billion as compared with Capex of $18.8 billion in 2023 and $23.1 billion in 2022.
The total number of mobile phone customers on Verizon network is around 115 million. Verizon works with both Ericsson and Nokia. Samsung is also a network partner for Verizon.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) launched an investigation into the outage, which caused widespread issues in major cities like Chicago and Seattle, where some iPhone users were stuck in “SOS” mode, Reuters news report said.
According to Downdetector.com, the outage began around 9:30 a.m. ET, with 28,842 reports logged by 5:02 p.m. ET. Other affected areas included Minneapolis, Phoenix, Omaha, and Denver.
Verizon stated that its engineers made progress throughout the day and that services had returned to normal.
“We apologize for any inconvenience our customers experienced today,” Verizon said, without disclosing the specific cause of the outage.
At the peak of the disruption, Downdetector reported around 105,000 outage reports by 11:19 a.m. ET.
FCC confirmed it is investigating the cause and scope of the service disruption, with Verizon customers taking to social media to report their devices being stuck in “SOS” mode. This occurs when iPhones lose cellular connection but can still make emergency calls through other carriers, as explained by Apple.
Rival carrier AT&T saw a small number of outage reports but clarified that its network was operating normally. AT&T noted that its customers’ difficulties may have been linked to attempts to connect with users on Verizon’s network.
The FCC is continuing its investigation into a February AT&T outage that affected over 70,000 customers and disrupted millions of calls, including attempts to reach 911.
Baburajan Kizhakedath