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Opinion based on few anecdotes, but I'm sure the blame lies with Singtel, especially given that there was initial finger-pointing that was then retracted. Class

Opinion based on few anecdotes, but I'm sure the blame lies with Singtel, especially given that there was initial finger-pointing that was then retracted. Classic "protect the castle, sacrifice the farmhouse (administrator)". I've heard from multiple sources that Optus in Australia is somewhat of a cash cow for Singtel in slightly undercutting Telstra's exorbitant pricing whilst absolutely minimising support and administrative costs. The 2022 security breach[0] being a potential example of a symptom. Interestingly the article specificies this as the cause: On Friday, Optus confirmed the outage was due to a configuration issue with more than 90 Cisco routers, which could not cope with changes to routing information supplied from Singtel Internet Exchange (STiX) after a routine software upgrade. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Optus_data_breach https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Optus_data_breach

defrost 3y ago
On the HN thread of the day that this happened I had a comment downvoted for suggesting the fault originated with Singtel (my fault for not expanding - it was in response to a rhetorical question that had 'Australia' as the 'obvious answer'). Regardless of the fault origins, this is a justified resignation. Optus (buck stops with CEO) totally and utterly borked the PR handling of this from the get go. They had multiple oportunities to get out in front, to shape the story, to make a statement. to answer a few obvious questions, etc. I've rarely seen a large company like this just ditch the playbook for handling PR in the face of a screwup and sit things out for hours with no comment. Was it eight hours before any kind of official response of substance? WTF was going on internally and where the hell was the PR dept.
- BLKNSLVR 3y ago
  It did seem strange that any response took such a long time, and even after that amount of time the response was effectively a shrug emoji. I mean, yes, it's lying, but standard playbook is to say something along the lines of "we've identified the cause and the resolution is proving trickier than initially estimated, but we're expecting full network service back up within X" I have to assume the CEO knew this was a final straw after the 2022 data breach, and this shit-show PR was essentially a free-kick since the writing was already on the wall. Was probably also told: you know you're fired, but not until you've fronted the senate committee, we're not going to subject our new CEO to that as their first order of business. Related: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-11-20/kelly-bayer-rosmarin-fate-sealed-before-resignation-optus-ceo/103126382 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-11-20/kelly-bayer-rosmarin-...

defrost 3y ago

On the HN thread of the day that this happened I had a comment downvoted for suggesting the fault originated with Singtel (my fault for not expanding - it was in response to a rhetorical question that had 'Australia' as the 'obvious answer'). Regardless of the fault origins, this is a justified resignation. Optus (buck stops with CEO) totally and utterly borked the PR handling of this from the get go. They had multiple oportunities to get out in front, to shape the story, to make a statement. to answer a few obvious questions, etc. I've rarely seen a large company like this just ditch the playbook for handling PR in the face of a screwup and sit things out for hours with no comment. Was it eight hours before any kind of official response of substance? WTF was going on internally and where the hell was the PR dept.

BLKNSLVR 3y ago
It did seem strange that any response took such a long time, and even after that amount of time the response was effectively a shrug emoji. I mean, yes, it's lying, but standard playbook is to say something along the lines of "we've identified the cause and the resolution is proving trickier than initially estimated, but we're expecting full network service back up within X" I have to assume the CEO knew this was a final straw after the 2022 data breach, and this shit-show PR was essentially a free-kick since the writing was already on the wall. Was probably also told: you know you're fired, but not until you've fronted the senate committee, we're not going to subject our new CEO to that as their first order of business. Related: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-11-20/kelly-bayer-rosmarin-fate-sealed-before-resignation-optus-ceo/103126382 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-11-20/kelly-bayer-rosmarin-...