The Latest Breaking News from Anika Wells

A second Optus triple-zero outage in as many weeks has raised the ire of a premier as calls mount for the government to empower regulators rather than telcos.

Australia's looming ban on social media for under 16s has won global praise at the UN, as one mother spoke of the impact social media had on her late daughter

Australia has foreshadowed changes to the nation’s telecommunications industry after a major company’s failure to connect hundreds of emergency calls was linked to four deaths

Asked today whether Optus’s chief executive should be considering his future after the “completely unacceptable” Triple Zero outage, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told the ABC “I would be surprised if that wasn’t occurring.” Communications Minister Anika Wells has also vowed “Optus will be held to account”.

The head of Optus has blamed a failure of "established processes" to address a triple-zero outage connected to three deaths, as calls for penalties mount.

Emergency calls were offline for nearly 14 hours, during which four people died – including an eight-week-old baby

Authorities say that social media platforms should not require age verification for all users when a ban on children under 16 having accounts goes into effect in December in Australia

Social media companies will have to detect and eject under-16s from their platforms, but this does not mean all users will have their ages checked.

Tech platforms to be responsible for preventing access to ‘abhorrent technologies’ under reforms announced by Canberra.