BT fined £17.5m for 999 ‘network fault’ calls | Business News

BT was fined £17.5 million for the network outage which affected 14,000 emergency calls and led to an “unacceptable risk”.

Ofcom, the telecommunications regulator, said the penalty was linked to a network failure on Sunday, June 25 last year.

The outage lasted more than 10 hours.

He judged that although the emergency services found no evidence of serious harm to members of the public using the 999 emergency service and the 112 service during the outage, there were a number of failures in BT’s handling of the situation.

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“We found that BT did not have sufficient warning systems in place for when this type of incident occurs, nor did it have adequate procedures in place to promptly assess the severity, impact and likely cause of any incident or to identify mitigating actions,” Ofcom said. .

“We also found that BT’s disaster recovery platform had insufficient capacity and functionality to handle a level of demand that could reasonably be expected.

“The incident also caused disruptions to text calls, which meant people with hearing and speech difficulties were unable to make calls, including to friends, family, businesses and services. “

The Ofcom report said BT’s emergency call handling system was initially disrupted by a “configuration error” in a file on its server.

The move to its disaster recovery platform was delayed by human error, the watchdog said.

He added that the backup system struggled to keep up with demand.

Suzanne Cater, director of enforcement at Ofcom, said: “Being able to contact emergency services can mean the difference between life and death, so in the event of any disruption to their networks, providers must be ready. to respond quickly and effectively.

“In this case, BT fell woefully short of its responsibilities and was ill-prepared to deal with such a large-scale outage, putting its customers at unacceptable risk.

“Today’s fine sends a broader warning to all companies: if you are not adequately prepared to deal with disruptions to your networks, we will hold you strictly accountable on behalf of consumers.”

Ofcom said BT reported the incident and cooperated fully.

He added that the company had taken steps to resolve the issues identified.