Thousands of users of Australian telecommunications operator Telstra reported phantom calls on their mobile devices, while some received delayed missed call or voicemail notifications, sometimes days later. Telstra acknowledged the issue with its MessageBank service on Wednesday evening, before reporting that the problem had been resolved the same day.
A Telstra spokesperson stated: "We identified an issue with our MessageBank service yesterday, which was resolved last night." They added that some users may have noticed several delayed missed call and voicemail notifications arriving all at once, with some dating back several days. "We are sorry for the confusion this may have caused," the spokesperson said.
The company is still investigating the cause of the problem, which is linked to a technical fault. Telstra stated that the issue was not the result of external influence or hacking. They also noted that there was no impact on calls to emergency services Triple Zero, voice calls or mobile data.
More than 3,000 comments from confused users appeared on Telstra's Facebook page. LisaMaree Collier wrote that she received a missed call on her work mobile from a personal mobile that was locked in a cup holder while she was driving and listening to an audiobook via Bluetooth. She added that there was no call on the private phone's call list. Steven Alexandrou said his father was right next to him, yet his phone showed he had been called. Simone Lou noted that the explanation was likely the reason her boss had called her out of hours, thinking she had called him, although she had not. Phil Richards commented: "Damn, I thought I had suddenly become very popular."
Telstra has 26 million mobile services on its network. In July, the company experienced a major national outage that affected millions of users, caused some train disruptions and prevented shops from using Eftpos terminals. Telstra then blamed a "software error". Chief Executive Vicki Brady stated that Telstra would take the necessary steps to ensure such an outage did not happen again.
