Tag: CRTC Rogers outage

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Mobile Syrup

Telecom news round up [Aug 13-19]

Welcome to another edition of MobileSyrup’s telecom news roundup.

Business

The Commission for Complaints for Telecom-television Services’ (CCTS) received 15,000 complaints in 2021. The CRTC-mandated organization summarized the details in its 2021 Compliance and Monitoring report. While the report lacks information about which companies received the most complaints, it does point to 4pairless communications twice when discussing breaches of its Procedural Code.

Six weeks after Rogers’ July 8th outage, the company has revealed more details surrounding the nationwide disturbance. More than 13 million wireline and wireless customers were impacted. When it came to restoring services, Rogers focused on wireless services first, followed by wireline services and critical care services. The disclosure results from several requests from various organizations demanding Rogers reveal more detail on the outage.

The CRTC is continuing its investigation into Rogers’ nationwide outage. The regulatory body has sent the company a list of questions it needs “to assess the situation.” The commission wants details on the company’s plan to separate its wireless and wireline networks, the direct economic losses the outage brought, and its impact on 911 services.

More on the CRTC, the commission has ruled it will decide on Telus’ application to charge credit card fees in 45 days. The CRTC commonly approves interim decisions 15 days after receiving applications. However, the commission says it won’t take that step in this case, given the number of interventions against Telus’ request. That figure sits in the thousands. More background on the topic is available here.

Internet Service Provider (ISP) TekSavvy has once again asked the Competition Bureau to address predatory internet pricing. In a letter, the ISP says large companies are offering retail internet prices under their flanker brands that cost less than the “inflated” prices they charge competitors. TekSavvy says the anti-competitive behaviour is going unchecked, leading ISPs to go out of business.

Infrastructure

Telus is planning on spending billions of dollars in British Columbia through 2026. Under the commitment, the Vancouver-based telecom giant will invest $33 million in Surrey this year. $13 million will also go towards New Westminster, $4 million to Richmond, and $105 million to Vancouver. The company has promised similar investments for several municipalities in Alberta.

Deals

The new school year is just around the corner, and several brands are offering decent promotions for students.

Public Mobile is offering students a 20GB data plan for $55/mo.

Rogers has offered some former customers a $45/25GB win-back plan.

Virgin Plus has a $45/20GB plan available for some customers, although getting it requires talking to an agent through chat.

Deals are also available through Nintendo and Amazon.

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Rogers reveals July 8 outage impacted over 13 million wireline, wireless customers

Rogers has shared more information regarding the July 8th outage.

We now know the outage impacted more than 13 million wireline and wireless customers. 2.9 million customers were wireline (consumers, businesses, etc.), and 10.2 million were wireless customers (postpaid, prepaid, wholesale, etc.).

The company provided more information on how the outage unfolded but kept specific details private. The available details reveal the system was impacted in minutes, affecting Rogers Internet Gateway, Core Gateway and Distribution Routers. The three could not communicate between themselves or the company’s cellular, enterprise, and cable networks.

“With the Core Gateways and Routers impacted, the wireless and wireline networks went offline and were unable to deliver traffic to and from residential and business customers,” Rogers says in its updated response.

Rogers initially shared details in a heavily redacted response to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) last month.

Restoring services

Wireless services were Rogers’ first priority of restoration. Wireline services were next. Critical care services (including police, hospital, and airports) was the third thing Rogers restored.

Restoring services for major infrastructure providers and business customers was fourth, and home internet services were fifth.

In its updated response, Rogers also provided specifics on actions it took following the outage and details on its internal process for major network upgrades.

What they didn’t disclose

Despite putting a figure on the outage for the first time, Rogers still didn’t share the breakdown by province or the impact on government services.

Rogers also didn’t share customer information and other third-party info, 911 calling stats and more technical details regarding their infrastructure.

The company says sharing confidential customer information isn’t necessary to understand the outage or the steps taken following the outage.

The company further states it won’t disclose technical information on its network and infrastructure as it would undermine the security of its network and potentially harm the public.

“Rogers purposely provided a detailed overview of the incident in order for the public to understand what occurred and why. Any further specificity would be of no assistance to the public but would be helpful to malicious actors seeking to disrupt our networks. There must be a balance.”

The company provides similar reasoning for not disclosing details on 911 call statistics. The company says it considered providing this info until they were told such statistics could disrupt their network.

More information needed

The recent disclosure of information resulted from requests put in by various organizations, including the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) and the Competitive Network Operators of Canada (CNOC). However, as Rogers notes in its recent response, all questions included in the requests were not answered. 

The CRTC has sent the company further questions to better understand the outage. In a letter dated August 5th, the commission wants to know the economic loss of the outage and confirmation customers received the compensatory credits the company promised.

Source: CRTC

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CRTC asks Rogers to provide more information regarding July 8th outage

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has asked Rogers to provide more information regarding the July 8th outage.

In a letter dated August 5th, the CRTC said more information is needed “for the Commission to assess this situation.”

The CRTC sent the Toronto-based telecom company initial questions following the outage last month. Rogers responded with a heavily redacted document that kept various details hidden from the public.

Since then, Rogers has vowed to separate its wireline and wireless networks to prevent all services from going down at the same time in the future.

Rogers CEO Tony Staffieri told the Standing Committee on Industry and Technology the process will cost $250 million, and the CRTC wants Rogers to provide information on how they got to this figure.

The commission is requesting a cost breakdown of the $250 million, details of implementation timelines and how separating networks will improve resilience. The CRTC is also asking for similar details regarding Roger’s plans to invest $10 billion in Artificial Intelligence and further testing and oversight.

Additionally, Rogers has to provide details on the direct economic losses of the outage and confirmation if residential and small business customers receive the credit the company promised. Rogers pledged to credit customers for five days of service, a move that’s estimated to cost $150 million.

Rogers is also asked to provide information on reports of network issues prior to the nationwide outage. Furthermore, the company has to answer questions related to 911 services and emergency alerting.

The CRTC initially asked Rogers to answer these questions by August 15th. However, the company has asked for the deadline to be extended by a week to August 22nd.

The CRTC said it’s still making a decision on PIAC’s request to make Rogers’ initial answers to the CRTC public.

“[Rogers] response has excessively redacted critical information that the public requires to understand what occurred during the outage and how Rogers plans to mitigate future risks and harms,” the PIAC said in its request.

Source: CRTC