A massive outage that knocked cell services out of service for hours had Americans wondering, “what caused the problems?”
More than a dozen cell phone providers, including AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile, have reported interrupted services, but there has yet to be an official explanation.
While we wait for answers, researchers have shared with DailyMail.com possible scenarios that could have led to tens of thousands of users losing cell service.
These experts suggested that the causes could be human error, a intentional malicious hacking or a solar flare that arose from the sun, although the latter is the least likely scenario.
Experts suggested the causes could be a misconfiguration of the cloud, an intentional malicious hack, or a solar flare that erupted from the sun just hours before the networks went down.
Lee McKnight, associate professor at iSchool (School of Information Studies) at Syracuse University in New York, said: ‘TThe dirty secret of telecommunications networks today is that they are nothing more than a bunch of cables and towers connected to the cloud like everything else in modern life, whether it’s Netflix or your supermarket.
‘With little information released about the cause of AT&T’s nationwide outages, the most likely cause is poor cloud configuration.
—Which is a fancy word for human error. Yesterday I was reviewing exactly this topic in class.’
Cloud misconfigurations are gaps, errors, and vulnerabilities that occur when security configurations are poorly chosen or completely neglected.
These errors can disrupt a system’s performance or leave the cloud open to infiltration by adversaries.
This issue allowed Russia and China to ‘attack Google’ in 2018.
Data belonging to users around the world was intercepted by servers in Nigeria, China and Russia, including those run by major state-owned telecommunications providers.
However, it is unknown whether hackers took advantage of Thursday’s outage.
DownDetector’s outage map highlights New York, Boston, Washington, Montreal, Honolulu, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Los Angeles, Seattle and San Francisco as hotspots with disruptive service.
Cloud misconfiguration can occur in several different ways, such as defaults not being changed.
Some refer to unchanged defaults as an “elementary mistake,” made by someone working with systems who did not change the default usernames and passwords.
Another is to ignore logs that collect information about system security breaches, unauthorized access, breaches, and other related items.
If records are not attended to in a timely manner, staff working on the system will be left with details that will be difficult to correct.
However, it’s unclear what type of cloud misconfiguration caused the outage or even if that was the problem.
“One possible, but much less likely, outcome is an intentional malicious attack on AT&T’s network, but the diffuse pattern of outages across the country suggests something more fundamental,” said McKnight, who is also an affiliate of the National Security Institute and Counterterrorism (INSTC). ).
AT&T has suffered data breaches in the last year, including one in March that affected nine million people.
In 2023, Ukraine’s main mobile service, Kyivstar, suffered a cyberattack that knocked out half the population, damaged IT infrastructure, and put millions of people at risk of not receiving alerts of possible Russian airstrikes.
AT&T was the victim of a solar flare in 1972 that disrupted landline services. A meteorologist shared on X that a solar flare erupted on the sun around midnight, hours before Thursday’s massive blackout.
However, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration website showed that a radio blackout occurred on the eastern side of Africa and below Asia.
But in the United States, most attacks have stolen data and have not caused a cellular blackout.
AT&T was the victim of a solar flare in 1972 that disrupted landline services.
The storm that hit Earth was compared to the 1859 event known as the Carrington Event, which saw the most intense geomagnetic storm in recorded history.
If such a solar storm were to occur in today’s world, the effects would be catastrophic on our communications systems.
A meteorologist shared online that a solar flare had emerged from the sun around midnight Thursday, noting that “the timing is interesting.”
‘Yes, a strong solar flare was reported around midnight. But is it related to the cell phone outage? It’s not impossible and the timing is interesting, but I’m not sure we can say that yet, Justin Horne with Texas-based KSAT 12 posted on X.
However, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration website showed that a radio blackout occurred on the eastern side of Africa and below Asia.
An ionization of the lower levels of the atmosphere by a solar flare that causes interference to long-range radios used by commercial airlines, military groups, and government agencies.
The outage, which appeared around 4 a.m. ET, left many iPhones in SOS mode, preventing them from making phone calls, sending messages or browsing the Internet.
The SOS Only appears in the upper right corner of the control center with the latest iOS software and in the upper left corner in older versions.
However, you can make SOS emergency calls to the authorities.
Some cellular networks appear to be coming back online, but that still leaves many wondering the million dollars over what triggered the massive outage.