Millions of Australians woke up on the morning of Nov. 8 to find that their phones were completely useless. An unplanned outage from nationwide provider Optus hit customers in the middle of their morning commute and extended throughout the entire day, throwing several systems into chaos. Businesses couldn't process electronic payments, hospitals couldn't take phone calls, and public transport was delayed. The downtime affected some 10 million Australians, equal to about 40% of the country's population.
Now, the outage has claimed its first head, as Optus CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin resigned Monday following a critical report from the Australian Senate. Her resignation puts an end to an eventful tenure as the head of Australia's second largest telecoms company, owned by Singapore Telecommunications, also known as Singtel.
